


No Temple But Everywhere

by OomnyDevotchka



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Appropriation of Christian Mythology, Based On Poetry, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Quick and Dirty History, Trilogy by H.D.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-04
Updated: 2014-08-31
Packaged: 2018-02-10 14:18:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 87,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2028225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OomnyDevotchka/pseuds/OomnyDevotchka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Never in Rome<br/>So many martyrs fell</i>
</p><p>A re-telling of the events of the Apocalypse, as shown through the eyes of some of the angels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Walls Do Not Fall

**Author's Note:**

> This fic, man. This fic. I thought it up in class almost a year ago, and then spent the first eleven days of November frantically writing it, until my laptop decided to crap out. Since then, it's been slow going, but it's finally, finally done. Extra super special thanks to my beta, [Nicodreams](nicodreams.tumblr.com), who helped me regain my flagging interest. Any remaining mistakes are all on me.
> 
> This is based on the superb "Trilogy" by H.D., specifically the second part "A Tribute to the Angels". The beginnings of each chapter are pulled directly from that poem. As this fic is highly canon-based, I've chosen to incorporate some dialogue from various episodes of the show, so any dialogue you recognize does not belong to me. The [ Supernatural Wiki](supernaturalwiki.com) has been invaluable in this endeavor.

_“Team Free Will. One ex-blood junkie, one dropout with six bucks to his name, and Mr. Comatose over there. Awesome._ ”

***

            Narrative symmetry, Castiel thinks as he hovers silently at the periphery of Bobby Singer’s living room, is highly overrated.

            It’s difficult to believe that it’s been a year since he was in almost this same position, except with Sam in the panic room instead of Dean.  
            Certainly, other superficial facts have changed since then – Castiel is a shadow of what he had been then, the consequences of his exile from Heaven nearly complete, the remaining vestiges of his power fluttering weakly at his chest. Bobby is in his chair now, the change in his personality almost as sharp as the change in his physicality as a result of his accident. Adam Milligan lies on Bobby’s couch, giving annoyed little sighs every few minutes, every inch the petulant teenager that Castiel suspects Dean and Sam rarely got the chance to be.

            Sam is different as well, the dark stain on his soul no longer so visible (Castiel hopes that is a result of being on a righteous path, rather than his own diminished vision, but who can be sure?), demon blood no longer flowing through his veins, thoughts of revenge no longer clouding his vision.

            Castiel does not feel good about it, because he’s grown quite fond of Sam over the past year, but he wishes more than anything to go back, to trap Sam in the panic room rather than Dean.

            Because as much as Castiel now likes Sam, Dean is, has always been, _more_. He is the nexus of Castiel’s faith now that he knows God is gone, he is the reason that Castiel rebelled in the first place, he is the origin and object of every human emotion that Castiel has ever had.

            Castiel may have spent the vast majority of his existence without experiencing human feelings, but he is not oblivious: he understands the nature of his relationship with Dean, or at least what he wishes his relationship with Dean was.

            The room has been silent for the past half-hour or so, ever since Dean’s frustrated yells from below have faded away. Bobby is half-heartedly leafing through one of his thick tomes, as though he’ll find an answer that wasn’t there the last time he looked. In the absence of his brother, Sam appears to have taken over his drinking, and is making his way through a half-full bottle of whiskey, albeit much more slowly than Dean would.

            Surprisingly enough, it’s Adam who breaks the silence. “So you’re an angel, right?” he asks, lolling his head to the side to fix his eyes on Castiel.

            “That is a complex question,” Castiel replies.

            Adam rolls his eyes, but presses on. “I mean, you knew this Michael guy, right? Zachariah kind of made him sound awesome. How could it be a bad thing to let him kill the devil?”  
            Castiel allows himself to process the question and decides to focus on each part separately. “I did not know Michael well,” he allows. “He was…above my pay grade, you could say.”

            “Because he’s an archangel?” Sam asks.

            “Yes,” Castiel says. “They didn’t much mingle with the foot soldiers. I knew Anna pretty well, of course, but by the time I knew Uriel, his archangel status had already been stripped.”

            “Archangels can be demoted?” Bobby says, at the same times as Sam yelps, “ _Uriel_ was an archangel?” Bobby and Sam exchange looks before Sam continues, “I thought you said there were only four archangels, Cas.”

‘           “Four angels who have seen the face of God,” Castiel corrects. “There are seven archangels – _were_ seven archangels.”

            “Wonderful,” Bobby mutters, “More superpowered dicks to deal with.”

            Castiel doesn’t even react to the slur against his brothers. It’s rather nice to know that he’s no longer included in this classification. “Admittedly, Azrael and Raphael might be problems, but Gabriel is in hiding, Uriel and Annael are dead, Michael will only be a problem if someone says yes, and Zadkiel has always been above this sort of thing. We should be fine.”

            “Well, that was helpful, thank you,” Adam says, and Castiel can suddenly see the Winchester in him more clearly than ever. It’s too much, and Castiel stands up abruptly, even though he can see from the eager look in Sam’s eyes that he wants to ask more questions.

            “I will go check on Dean,” Castiel says, sweeping out of the room before anyone can answer.

            There was a time when Castiel would have liked nothing better than to talk about the Seven, to tell the stories of faith and heroism and the consequences of disobedience that he knows by heart, but now it would just be painful.

            He descends the steps to Bobby’s basement. Though checking up on Dean had been mostly an excuse, a distraction, Castiel is worried about the lack of noise from the panic room. Dean is brash and loud and unwilling to censor himself for anyone. He is also extremely intelligent, and a silent Dean reminds Castiel uncomfortably of a silent child: he’s likely up to something.

            Although Castiel knows that it’s impossible for Dean to have escaped, impossible for Dean to have said yes, he still worries when his calls for Dean go unanswered.

            He ducks his head to look through the peephole in the heavy iron door and into the room, and grows even more worried when he can’t see Dean. Certainly, he doesn’t have a complete view of the room through the small peephole, and it is entirely possible, even likely, that Dean is just sulking out of view. But images of Dean, injured or passed out or dead, spring unbidden to Castiel’s mind, and he opens the door and steps into the room without really thinking about it.

            He hears Dean’s voice say, “Cas,” and turns around to see that Dean has drawn a bloody sigil on the wall and is preparing to press his hand to it.

            Dozens of thoughts go through Castiel’s mind in that split second before Dean’s hand meets the wall: How did Dean manage to cut himself in this room? How could Castiel have been so stupid as to fall for so transparent a trick? Where would he end up being sent this time?

            These thoughts are all filtered through the most immense sense of betrayal that Castiel has ever felt, even worse than when Joshua had told him that God had abandoned the earth. He meets Dean’s eyes and can see that Dean is aware of this betrayal, but it’s like looking into the eyes of a man condemned – Dean is too far gone to stop now.

            As Dean’s hand meets the sigil and a rushing white light fills the room, Castiel spares another thought to narrative symmetry. Fitting, that he was the one to let Sam out of the panic room and start the apocalypse, and now he will be the one to let Dean out of the panic room and finish it.

            He’s angrier than he can ever remember being, but he recognizes that a large part of that anger is directed towards himself, not Dean.


	2. The Book of Azrael

_[5]_

_Nay – peace be still –_

_lovest thou not Azrael,_

_the last and greatest, Death?_

***

            Death is the constant, the before and the after and the during, the beginning-end and the end-beginning, and the eons and eons of middle. Death is Azrael, though very few call him that; it lacks the immediacy and horror that the humans thrive on, and not one of his brothers (for they are his brothers, they _are_ , though he will Reap every last one of them in time) has seen fit to speak with him for quite some time.

            Death is above boredom, though, above loneliness, above time and space and archaic notions of family. He is above Elohim himself, he is Death the Ouroboros, the first bleeding into the last, the being that rose from primordial chaos and that will survive when primordial chaos returns.

            Death is also, as it were, sitting in a pizza parlor in twenty-first century Chicago.

            Oh, he exists in every moment in time at once, knows all that ever was and all that ever will be, but some are more immediate than others. Right now, in this moment, he’s been dragged into one of his brothers’ periodic hissy fits, and he is not pleased.

            Ordinarily, Death can ignore these contests, these small ripples in his consciousness, and simply send his Reapers to do heavier work in certain parts of the world. He can retreat into himself, can try to forget the days when he was one of the Seven, when he existed in Heaven with the best of them.

            It’s Lucifer’s fault, because it always is, because no one but the Morningstar would’ve dug up that old Enochian binding spell.

            Lucifer was always as intelligent as he was stunning, and Death has never been more irritated by that fact than he is at this moment. Death is everything, he is everywhere and everywhen at once, so far above one paltry little fallen angel that it is laughable, and he does not take kindly to being yanked about on a chain.

            Lucifer’s plotting and planning has brought him to Chicago, and Death feels like he needs to do something drastic, like he needs to wipe this entire city off the map with one flick of his wrist, because Sam and Dean Winchester are proving much more stubborn than he’d thought.

            The bell above the front door of the pizza parlor tinkles gently, and Death smiles, reminding himself to go easy on Crowley in the future.

            Dean Winchester walks into the room, all swagger to cover up an endless well of self-doubt. He’s carrying the scythe, that ridiculous weapon that the humans have somehow become convinced he carries.

            Though he supposes that the scythe is less insulting than the skull for a face. True, his vessel is aged and worn, likely frightening by human standards, but he’s hardly a skeleton.

            It’s amazing how much humans can get wrong, sometimes.

            With barely a thought, Death causes the scythe in Dean’s hand to heat up, so quickly and effectively that Dean drops it with a muffled curse after just a few seconds. It’s true that the scythe was never a threat to Death, but he summons it to himself anyway. He’s fond of keeping up illusions, sometimes, and the vessels are stubborn creatures who will be better bent to his will if they believe they have a chance to kill him.

            They do not, of course, because Death is the one thing about this universe that is eternal, the one thing in this universe that will survive after it collapses, after all the matter and antimatter collapse into one little ball and explode outward again, creating another universe, another planet, another _God_.

            It has happened before and it will happen again, and Death will continue to act as though he is subservient, because he learned in his first few universes that exposing his ultimate omnipotence is really no fun at all.

            All his thoughts are irrelevant, in any case, because Dean Winchester, Michael’s chosen vessel, the most important human in this current incarnation of the universe, is approaching the table, and Death thinks it’s only polite to offer him pizza.

            (Despite his omnipotence, despite his power, Death often finds himself with a weakness to the local cuisine. Call it sentimentality, call it stupidity, call it pointless, but Death likes things like a good Chicago pizza.

            It makes it harder to forget the inventors when they’re gone, when the world has started over yet again and there are new creatures to get in contact with, new languages and cultures and worlds, new landmarks and bodies and _everything_. Somehow, the distinguishing features of a species fade over a millennia or two, barely blips in the times that Death has experienced, and Death is so _tired_ , so damn tired of this existence.)

            Dean Winchester is hardly a new phenomenon, the type of snarky, rebellious creature that Death has seen and met and interacted with a thousand, a million times. Along with the local cuisine, beings like this are one of Death’s weaknesses.

            It’s amusing, almost, seeing them rail against things they cannot control, and as they speak, Death barely having to think to translate from his own language, so old now that there is no being in existence that can speak or understand it, save him, into English, Death finds himself liking Dean more and more.

            Even if he didn’t like Dean, the fact remains that Dean is, along with his brother and the latest of the fallen angels, his best chance to break the ugly, clumsy chains that tie him to Lucifer, and so Death continues speaking, occasionally tapping his gaunt fingers against the table.

            He can see Dean’s sharp green eyes following his every movement, can see them fixed on the little square trinket. Even if Death didn’t know what he was after, didn’t know that this plan will work at the cost of plenty of blood and tears from the Winchester brothers, he would be able to figure it out. Dean is many things, but he is not subtle.

            When Death finally offers him the ring, stretching out his fingers and giving them a little wiggle so that the light catches on the white stone, Dean looks disbelieving, like he simply cannot believe that good things can ever happen to him. And true, Dean Winchester’s life has been more tragic than most, has been soaked in ash and blood and pain from the very beginning, but it has hardly been without its moments of light. Dean has a brother who is devoted to him, a brother whom he loves fiercely in return. Dean has a father-figure, has good memories with his mother and father and friends, and was pulled out of Hell by a being who venerates him above all others.

            Death has seen worse lives than Dean Winchester’s, is the point, has seen children snuffed out of existence before their first birthday, has seen war and genocide and every terrible thing that this world has to offer. He has remained stoic, has Reaped the souls that needed to be Reaped without making exceptions, and so Dean Winchester’s wide, disbelieving eyes can only affect him so much.

            Death is not heartless, though, is not without emotion in his own way, and so he thinks that even if his freedom hadn’t depended on it, he might have given Dean the ring anyway.

            It exchanges hands, going from Death’s soft, pale, and cold ones to Dean’s tanned, calloused, and slightly dirty ones.

            As Death watches Dean go, watches him meet up with the demon Crowley, a being that he would not consider working with under better circumstances, he allows his mind to be pulled away from this apocalypse.

            Much to do, after all, and the loss of his ring is immaterial to his work.

***

            Death does not remember how he first came into existence, the time in between is so vast and impenetrable, misty and diaphanous in the depths of his memory, but he remembers the beginning of this world.

            There was nothing, the past world having just collapsed into a tightly packed bundle of matter. No stars, no atoms, not even darkness, just the endless void.

            But there was Death, incorporeal and vast, spread out over the nothingness, the oblivion, and then everything exploded, spinning outward at the speed of light. Bodies formed, hydrogen and helium combining into suns, nuclear fusion beginning, the forces of gravity pulling all the matter into orbit around them.

            And Death waited, waited for the new God to show himself and act as though he’d created something new, instead of just provided the catalyst for more of the same.

            And these beings _are_ always the same, arrogant and petty no matter how much they pretend otherwise. When this one appeared, a beam of light and intention that would be overwhelming to any creature he had actually created, calling himself Elohim and Yahweh and Jehovah and a thousand other names in a thousand other tongues, Death had merely nodded his head (as it were. He is used to using metaphorical language when it comes to describing his incorporeal state) and agreed, allowing Elohim to think that he had created Death along with everything else.

            God named him Azrael, then, and again Death accepted it. He’d been called worse things, certainly, and Azrael had a sort of ring to it, sounded triumphant and good and full of intention. Death is none of these things, of course, has never been any of these things, but he was not above pretending.

            And then God gave him a job, the same job he’d been doing since the beginning of all, and Death began to work.

            But he’s telling the story out of order. It’s easy to do, for him.

            The inclusion of Death into the Seven was a new phenomenon, something that had never happened in all of his years. He had never had siblings, had always been just odd and unknowable enough to make the current God uneasy. He didn’t know if this particular being was simply more arrogant than the rest, or if he didn’t care, because Elohim turned to DeathAzrael after an indeterminable amount of time, radiating benevolence and a smug sense of superiority, and breathed out pure creation energy, and six more beings of light were created, clustered around DeathAzrael like the planets around their suns.

            Elohim went around and named these beings of light, touching each one and receiving their worshipful energy in return. “Gabriel,” he said, voice corporeal for the first time. “Annael. Uriel. Raphael. Michael. Zadkiel.”

            And things were good. For a while. But, as usual, the God was arrogant; the God thought he knew best. The God created others, a host of creatures that he called angels, though he gave the Seven, the archangels, dominion over them all. The God created the Earth, the seas, the animals and the plants and the bacterium and the fungi, and then the God created the humans, and that was when everything promptly went to Hell.

            Literally.

            DeathAzrael knew it would be Lucifer, of course, because DeathAzrael still knew everything, but all the other angels seemed surprised. Although Lucifer was most assuredly not one of the Seven, was for all intents and purposes just another ordinary Seraph, there had been something about him from the beginning, a terrible beauty that drew the others to him like moths to a flame, that engendered that ridiculous nickname, the Morningstar.

            And Lucifer was perhaps even more arrogant than the God, than Elohim, and the God could not stand that, couldn’t stand the questioning and the implication that he could be anything less than perfect. The God selected Michael, the one of the Seven who had admired Lucifer the most, to strike him down, and that was the moment that DeathAzrael went back to being just Death, stopped pretending to be subservient to the God and descended down to Earth, taking a human vessel without a thought and continuing his work. Death may have had brothers this time around, but he was not and would never be truly an angel, and no one needed to give Death permission to do anything.

            And he had stayed on Earth for millennia, adjusting to the rules of existence in the latest world. Elohim, after finally accepting that Death was not under his control (it took a much shorter period of time than Death might have expected; Lucifer’s betrayal had shaken him) had suggested the Reapers, a race of beings to help him with his job. Death had agreed, because for all his power, he did not like fighting and would rather not have to put Elohim in his place. He’d even grown to like the creatures, connected with them as he’d watched human empires rise and fall, watched pagan gods ascend and descend, watched Elohim make mistake after mistake from on high before finally running, leaving his Heaven in a state of disarray.

            Death could probably fix the troubles in Heaven with barely a look, but he is not built for leadership, and besides, he has already seen what must happen.

            When Tessa, a Reaper of whom he is particularly fond, first came to him empty-handed, he already knew that she had found the Vessels, that this would not be the first time that these particular humans escaped his grasp.

            But it was not time to meet them yet, would not be time to meet them for a few human years, yet, and so Death waited.

            He had always been good at waiting.

***

            When Lucifer speaks the words of an Enochian spell that serve to bind Death to him, serve to take away a bit of Death’s autonomy, Death sighs but rises obediently.

            “Well Hello, Death,” Lucifer drawls out, and Death is not surprised that he does not recognize him as Brother. Even when Death was DeathAzrael he did not pay much attention to Lucifer.

            Lucifer is in the wrong vessel, because he is in Carthage, Missouri and not Detroit. This vessel is a blond man, lesions already on his skin from the strain of holding the angel inside, his spirit screaming to be set free, and Death vaguely remembers taking his wife and only child. A home invasion, a burglary, and it does not take an omnipotent being to understand why Nick said yes while Sam holds out.

            Speaking of Sam, Death can see him across the dark of the cemetery, kneeling next to Dean with an expression of shocked horror on his face.

            Ellen and Jo Harvelle were lovely women, Death is sure, and he had sent Tessa herself to collect them and bring them to Heaven, but death is still devastating to humans, and the fact that the Colt did not work on Lucifer (things it cannot kill: angels, God, Death, and Leviathan) must be perceived by them as still another blow, as though Ellen and Jo are gone for nothing.

            Although Death knows he cannot contact them here, cannot give them his ring and send them on the path to breaking this new and irritating limit on his power, he wants to, wants to end this messy business as quickly as possible.

            There is the whispering of wings, and Death watches Castiel appear and spirit the brothers away. His power has quite obviously faded to a fraction of what it once was, and Death rolls his eyes at Elohim’s continued arrogance, thinking that he has the right to punish Castiel for rebelling, when Castiel is the best of all of the angels God ever created.

            As they disappear, Lucifer catches Death’s eyes and grins, his own way of letting Death know that he chose to let the brothers go.

            “Why did you not go after the Vessels?” Death asks, allowing his contempt to creep into his voice. “They are emotionally vulnerable right now; surely you could have gotten Sam to say yes.”

            Lucifer’s smile grows and he begins to speak, telling Death what Death already knows. Death tunes him out, giving a cursory look around the cemetery and seeing the bodies of all of the demons that Lucifer had sacrificed to raise him sprawled across the ground.

            Tessa and a few other Reapers are moving among them, addressing the souls of the humans that the demons had killed and skipping over the bodies in which the hosts were miraculously still alive. Death resists the urge to shudder. Demons. Filthy, the lot of them.

            Lucifer finishes, and Death feels a tug on the metaphorical chain that connects the two of them. “C’mon then, Horseman,” Lucifer says. “We have work to do.”

***

            The Horseman thing is, once again, Elohim trying to exert his influence over Death, trying to put Death into a box. Death minds it less than he minded the angel thing, because at least the Horsemen have mostly free rein over the Earth. Besides, he has always liked his pale horse, and never more so than in its modern form, a sleek white ’59 Cadillac.

            Cars. Such a useful human invention. He will miss them when this world implodes.

            In any case, Death makes his way to Sioux Falls, South Dakota as soon as Lucifer takes his eye off him for a second. Although Death knows how all this ends, knows that the Winchesters will end this ridiculous Apocalypse with the help of his ring, some of the details of the _how_ remain fuzzy, because human free will is powerful enough to mess with even Death’s perception.

            He likes it, though – it’s not often that anything is powerful enough to affect him, and free will is rather nicer than Lucifer’s spell.

            He goes to Sioux Falls because he knows that Bobby Singer will be in Stull Cemetery in a few months when this ends, and he uses a power that he hasn’t used in quite a while and raises some of the dead.

            He could raise just Karen Singer, he supposes – he is trying to send a message, not set zombies on the already terrified humans – but he does like the idea of giving Lucifer a bit of a middle finger, so he raises more as well. It’s only Karen that he speaks to, though, a slight blonde woman with light, trusting eyes. He didn’t work as hard as he could have on the whole resurrection thing, so her face and lips are pale, but she’s pretty enough. What’s more, she actually listens to him, despite the fact that her whole body is trembling minutely the entire time.

            Death sends her off to the house where Bobby Singer waits in his wheelchair and feels something like excitement at the idea that Bobby will get to see his wife again.

            This excitement is, of course, dampened by the fact that Karen doesn’t seem to feel the need to actually pass on his message, and, though Sam and Dean do end up coming to town, they don’t find him. Disgusted – more with himself for using such a fallible and clumsy method of communication than with them, Death begins the slow process of sending the resurrected people back to the grave. It’s true that the way he has chosen to do this may very well end up with those people going crazy, as the human mind is not designed to withstand the pressure of resurrection, but that is hardly his problem; he may even have let them live if Karen had just done as he asked.

            He feels Lucifer tug on the chain again and disappears from Sioux Falls, popping up next to Lucifer three states over.

            What does he have to do to get these boys’ attention? Wipe an entire city off the map?

***

            At the End, long after Sam and Dean Winchester have been lost to the annals of time, Death meets Elohim at the edge of the Earth.

            All life has long since ceased here, except for some of the particularly stubborn bacterium, the types that live inside active volcanoes and on the ocean floor and can seemingly survive anything. All of Death’s Reapers, even Tessa, are dead at his hands, every angel barely a memory.

            At the End, as always, it is only Death and the God, watching as the suns supernova and collapse, as they dim completely, as nuclear fusion ends.

            Elohim looks tired, worn down from millennia and millennia of existence, and Death wants to laugh, wants to ask this insignificant being how he thinks _Death_ feels, but he doesn’t because nothing will come of it. Nothing ever comes of it.

            Elohim sighs. When he has taken vessels in the past, they have varied in age, sex, physical characteristics, everything. Now, though, he has taken the form that the humans had once liked to picture him in, that of a benevolent old man with a long white beard.

            Death, on the other hand, has not changed his form since the very beginning, and he wraps familiar long fingers around the edge of his cane, clunky ring back on his finger, and waits for Elohim to speak.

            “I never had any control over you, did I, Azrael?” Elohim finally asks, and Death almost smiles at that name. It was a good time, despite its ending, when he was DeathAzrael, and he looks back on it fondly.

            “Of course you didn’t,” Death says. “One would think that you thought you were the first God I’d met.”

            Elohim meets his eyes, the eons stretching out between them like a guitar string. “I am afraid, Azrael,” he says in barely a whisper, the paper-skin of his eyelids fluttering. He looks it, but he also looks frail and weak and finished, and Death knows that, no matter how afraid they are (and they are always afraid, that is almost as constant as he himself), they always welcome the oblivion he brings.

            Death does not say anything, because nothing will make Elohim feel better, and he is not overly concerned with Elohim’s feeling, in any case.

            Instead, he waits a few more moments for Elohim to go over the years in his mind, to remember every triumph and mistake, and then he touches Elohim’s shoulder.

            The God shudders as the life leaves him, and Death abandons his vessel at the same time, taking to the skies. He will miss his vessel, having grown rather fond over the eons of the way people responded to it, but it is a vague feeling, so much more diffuse when he is incorporeal.

            The universe collapses and then explodes again, destruction and creation in almost the same moment, and another God ascends, and it is no longer the End but the Beginning, again, and Death wishes he, himself, could take part in the oblivion he gives to others.

            He cannot, will not, and that is his lot, and so Death turns to the new God and begins again.

            So it goes.


	3. The Book of Raphael

_lovest not the sun,_

_the first who giveth life,_

_Raphael? lovest thou me?_

_lover of sand and shell,_

_know who withdraws the veil,_

_holds back the tide and shapes_

_shells to the wave-shapes? Gabriel:_

_Raphael, Gabriel, Azrael,_

_three of seven – what is War_

_to Birth, to Change, to Death?_

_yet he, red-fire is one of seven fires,_

_judgement and will of God,_

_God’s very breath – Uriel._

***

           Raphael’s job as the protector of prophets has been less than exciting in the past couple thousand years.

            Prophets just aren’t what they used to be, aren’t in danger of being killed for their beliefs or being burned as witches.

           Raphael thinks that his father might rebuke him for these thoughts, for wishing that he could go down and smite away some danger, but his father is most likely dead, and if he isn’t, he no longer cares about his children.

           Raphael’s vaguely aware of the Apocalypse that’s going on, but he can’t bring himself to care much. He was never close with either Lucifer or Michael, and so it all seems like pointless squabbling.

           For the last twenty-five years or so, the only prophet that Raphael has watched over has been Charles Shurley. A weedy little man with an ordinary little life, Chuck’s biggest brush with danger had been the time that he almost walked into the middle of the street after one too many drinks.

           So, when that little sense in the back of Raphael’s mind begins acting up one day, the ‘a prophet is in danger’ sense, he’s not so much worried as he is excited. What’s more, this danger feels more important, more visceral, than any he has felt since the times of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

           Why that is becomes clear as soon as Raphael gets to earth. Chuck is in a motel room in the middle of nowhere, standing next to both the Vessels, the reason for all this Apocalypse nonsense in the first place, and the first demon.

            Raphael gets closer and closer, summoning the power that crackles through him. It builds to a fever pitch, and he knows that, inside the motel room, the light of his form is nearly blinding and the sound of his voice nearly deafening.

           And then, anti-climactically, Lilith smokes out of her vessel, and Raphael is left, once again, with nothing to do.

           Another of his brothers might be curious as to why Chuck was in the room with Lilith, might be curious about the Vessels themselves, but Raphael just resigns himself to more boredom and goes back to Heaven.

           It doesn’t concern him, at this point in time.

***

            Surprisingly, the humans actually got quite a bit right in their depiction of Biblical times. True, Adam and Eve were rather more metaphorical than they were made out to be, and were far from the only humans created directly by God, it was true that there were two boys, brothers, named Cain and Abel.

            Cain was the elder, and Abel, the younger, and they were the perpetrator and the victim of the first ever murder, respectively.

            At the time, Raphael was very young, and very idealistic. The murder shook him to his very core, because the idea of some of God’s creations being able to do that to themselves was so horrendous that he wouldn’t have been able to contemplate it until it happened.

            He didn’t know, at the time, that those two brothers were the start of a bloodline that would continue down countless generations, through all of recorded human history, up to the late twentieth century, when it culminated in the birth of Sam and Dean Winchester, the Vessels of Michael and Lucifer.

            Though Abel was slain before he could marry and have children, his parents were not quite finished procreating, and had another child, Seth, not long after Abel’s death.

            Seth married, and his offspring populated the Earth, while Cain, disGraced and in exile, angry at the God who he felt had betrayed him, did the same.

            Thousands of years later, a direct descendant of Seth, going by the name of John Winchester, fell in love with a direct descendant of Cain, Mary Winchester.

           And although their blood was mixed in their two sons, there could only be one true Vessel for Michael, and one for Lucifer. It wasn’t until Azazel, on the orders of his trapped master, opened his own vein and dripped his blood into the mouth of six-month-old Sam Winchester, that it was set in stone.

***

           When it starts to concern him is the next time he’s alerted to Chuck being in danger. Heaven is in uproar because another angel has disobeyed, has broken away from Heaven: little Castiel, one of the most unassuming of the seraphs, and seemingly one of the most faithful. The one who had pulled Dean Winchester out of Hell, and Raphael remembers how quietly pleased he’d been when he returned to Heaven with the news, how his entire being glowed just a little bit brighter, infused with fervor and love for God.

           It seems that it’s always the brightest that Fall – first Lucifer, then Annael, now Castiel. Though, Raphael supposes that Castiel hasn’t quite fallen, yet. He probably won’t get a chance to, because Raphael’s assignment is to kill him.

           The higher-ups in Heaven had been planning the Apocalypse for a while, keeping the majority of the angels in the dark. Somehow, probably just by virtue of being one of the three remaining members of the Seven, Raphael had been included in the plan, although he never displayed much enthusiasm for it at all. Castiel’s crime was siding with the humans, teleporting Dean Winchester out of Heaven’s custody to stop his abomination of a brother from raising Lucifer from Hell.

           This betrayal had, for whatever reason, necessitated a visit to Chuck, which is why Raphael is now making his way towards the prophet’s house at the speed of light. Apparently, fallen angels now represent a huge threat to prophets, and despite the fact that Raphael is quite sure that Castiel will not actually hurt Chuck, his orders are clear, and he doesn’t want to put a price on his own head.

           As Raphael makes his way towards the house, he wonders why Castiel does not fly away. He would have plenty of time; Raphael is purposely going a bit more slowly than he could, because disinterested as he is in this skirmish, in the politics of his brothers, he is still loathe to kill one of them.

           He supposes he knows the answer – somehow, when he wasn’t looking, Castiel had thrown his lot in with the humans.  
            Raphael was never _against_ the humans, per se, not like Lucifer or even Uriel, but he does not understand the appeal, does not understand what would cause an angel to give up his entire being, all his brothers, and Heaven itself, for one of them.

           He cannot put this off any longer, not if he does not want Michael to question his loyalties. He draws close to the house, windows rattling in their frames from the force of his approach, and sees Castiel standing in front of the window in his vessel, back straight and eyes defiant. Next to him is Chuck, looking like he’s trying to do the same, although he is only human and so is bent over, eyes screwed shut and hands clasped over his ears.

            “Raphael,” Castiel acknowledges, no sign of remorse in his voice, no sign of any inclination to excuse himself or to beg for forgiveness. Raphael is grudgingly impressed, but he has work to do. With a wave of his hand, Castiel’s vessel explodes, the Grace within ceasing to exist under the force of Raphael’s superior power. Raphael vaguely recognizes that there had still been a human life inside the vessel, and that that life is now also extinguished by his doing, but he feels nothing of it, despite the fact that he likely could have saved the human’s life.

           But that would have taken time and effort, and Raphael simply does not care.

           He returns to Heaven. His brothers can deal with the fallout from this while he watches from afar.

***

            When the Seven were created, they were as one. They acted only in the interest of God, and that did not allow much room for variation. Though they were separate beings, though they were called by separate names, they were in harmony and accord, and there was never any dissention in their ranks.

            Until Lucifer.

            The Seven were God’s lieutenants, God’s representatives. Even before the creation of humanity, they were there to be God’s proxy to the lesser angels.

            Lucifer was different from the beginning. He was luminous and radiant, and God was fascinated. He began to favor Lucifer above the other lesser angels, almost as much as he favored the Seven.

           Raphael’s first experience with doubt was when he realized the extent of God’s fondness for Lucifer, and he was not the only one. He watched as the other members of the Seven became differentiated from each other – Michael became close to Lucifer, almost as close as God himself; Uriel and Annael began to gravitate towards each other; Gabriel began spending time with the lesser angels; Zadkiel withdrew into himself; Azrael didn’t seem to change; and Raphael…

            He tried his best not to show it, but Raphael became angry. Why, he wondered to himself, should this mere Seraph be allowed privileges the likes of which only the Seven were meant to enjoy? Why was it that the lesser angels were beginning to look up to Lucifer, as though this upstart were as worthy of their devotion as the Seven, or as God himself? What made Lucifer so magnetic, so _special_?

            Raphael never received answers to these questions, but they were wiped from his mind entirely when the rumors began to circulate that Lucifer had been allowed to see the face of God.

            Though God had been communicating with the Seven since their creation, he had never done so in a way that allowed them to see his form. Even his voice was not like the voices of the angels – it was more of a feeling, a divine command that seemed to come from deep within.

            Raphael had never wondered what God was like outside of that feeling, but the idea that Lucifer may know drove him into a rage the likes of which he had never felt.

           Still, Raphael kept it to himself, because no angel had ever expressed anger and he did not want to be the first one to experience the consequences of doing so. He could feel himself becoming warped and bitter, and, despite being taught for his entire existence how dangerous those feelings were, he couldn’t bring himself to regret it.

           His bitterness was alleviated, for a short time, when Gabriel, practically vibrating with excitement, told him that he had been chosen, along with Gabriel himself and Michael, to see the face of God.

           Raphael rejoiced at this news, and for the first time since Lucifer’s creation, he felt some of the old fire, some of the absolute devotion towards his father that he remembered from the days when it was only the Seven.

           This changed when the three of them (Michael trying his best to be stoic while still letting some of his joy show through and Gabriel not bothering to hide his feelings in the slightest) were finally ushered into the room to see God.

            Raphael’s first thought was that God didn’t look like he’d expected. Far from being a ball of celestial intent, like the angels, God was strangely small-looking. He was also completely corporeal, and Raphael began to understand concepts that he never had before.

            God had a body. Two legs, two arms, one head. A face, lined but kindly. Long, luxuriant hair of a dark, rich brown that was fading to gray at the temples.

            Raphael had never seen another creature like this, and he was completely unsettled by it. He had always been taught that the angels were as close to God as a being could be, so why did they not look the same?

           God’s thin lips curled up in what Raphael suddenly knew was a smile. “My children,” he said, his deep voice as corporeal as the rest of him.

           Michael was the only one to reply. “Father,” he said, moving forwards. “Why have you called us here?”

           God paused for a long moment. “Well, Michael,” he said, seeming to choose each word carefully. “Though you, and each and every one of your brothers, is precious to me, I have decided that I have more love to give.”

           He sounds like he is skirting around something, like he is telling half-truths, and Raphael is liking this situation less and less as the conversation goes on. Beside him, Gabriel is uncharacteristically silent, while Michael appears to be focused completely on what God is saying, to the exclusion of everything else.

           God pauses again, and then he says the words, the ones that , though Raphael didn’t know it at the time, would cause him to lose his faith forever, would cause him to one day hope that God was gone for good.

           “I’ve decided to create an entirely new species of being,” God says, and raises his arms, gesturing at his own body. “They will be called humanity.”

***

            Raphael should have known that he would not be allowed to stay neutral on this. Michael has commanded it, so he is back on earth.

            Since Lucifer’s rising, minor skirmishes of angels and demons have been common. Although even the most minor of angels are more powerful than any demon could possibly be, the angels are outnumbered. The legions of Hell are seemingly infinite, with new demons being created in the depths of the pit every day, and the number of angels is dwindling.

            Michael had ordered every angel to take a vessel and help fight, which is how Raphael finds himself in Maine, inhabiting the body of a local mechanic, and ending one such skirmish with a blast of power. Immediately after, he leaves his vessel, because he hates it, hates being confined inside flesh and bone and muscle.

            He’s halfway around the world when Castiel’s voice comes to him, low and gravelly, speaking an ancient chant. The “I’m here, Raphael. Come and get me, you little bastard,” he tacks onto the end of the prayer isn’t exactly customary, and Raphael surmises that Castiel must be a little put out about the whole killing thing.

            No one had been more surprised than Raphael when, mere minutes after he had killed his wayward brother and Sam Winchester had opened the cage and brought Lucifer back to earth, a great shudder had gone up through the community of angels. Something that had never happened before, something that not even the oldest of the angels had a reference for: Castiel had returned to life.

            Some angels took that as a sign of God’s return, though they didn’t posit this theory loudly. Michael was set in his ways, had declared Castiel Wrong and had sentenced him to death, and so he had refused to entertain the possibility that it may be in God’s plan to keep Castiel on earth.

            Raphael had given the idea a bit more consideration, but the very idea of God coming back to resurrect this inconsequential little seraph, when he had been lost to his better children for so long, made him unspeakably angry.

            No, he had decided, it must have been some other force that returned Castiel to life: Lucifer, perhaps.

            He ignores the fact that he knows that Lucifer is not capable of resurrecting an angel.

            Raphael comes when Castiel calls, though, mostly because he is curious as to what’s going on. It’s the first time he’s seen his brother since their last encounter in Chuck Shurley’s house, and, although he knew intellectually that Castiel had returned, it’s still a shock to see his brother there like Raphael had never scattered all his being to the four corners of the earth.

            Raphael’s vessel is drooling in a wheelchair – a necessary sacrifice – and surrounded by a circle of holy fire. Outside the circle, Castiel stands, tall and proud, next to a slouching figure that Raphael recognizes as Dean Winchester, Righteous Man and Michael’s true vessel.

            Raphael has the power to make himself undetectable to Castiel, and he has done so, but he almost wants to reveal himself just to laugh at Castiel’s stupidity. Does he really think that Raphael would fall for this trick, take his vessel without checking the scene first?

            Scoffing to himself, Raphael settles in to wait, taking his vessel only when Dean and Castiel have extinguished the flames and left. Though Dean has Enochian marks on his ribs that would prevent Raphael from finding him in any situation, it is easy for him to track Castiel through the town. He figures out where they are heading and touches down just as Dean’s car roars to a stop outside.

            Dean and Castiel come through the front door, and Raphael hears Castiel bite out, “Dean, wait,” and that’s when he reveals himself, manifesting his wings in the form of lightning and causing the light bulbs in the tiny cabin to shatter. “Castiel,” he says.

            “Raphael,” Castiel replies evenly, stepping forward. Dean follows him, and Raphael wonders what is going on there, how this human and his brother had come to trust each other so implicitly.

            “And I thought you were supposed to be impressive,” Dean cuts in. “All you do is black out the room.”

            “And the Eastern Seaboard,” Raphael says casually. He has heard tales of Dean Winchester’s tendency to mouth off, but he is unprepared for the surge of dislike that rises within him at Dean’s flippant words. Raphael is used to respect, and it irks him when he does not get it, especially from beings as low as the two standing before him. “It is a testament to my unending mercy that I do not smite you here and now.”

            “Or maybe you’re full of crap,” Dean shoots back. “Maybe you’re afraid God will bring Cas back to life again and smite you and your candy-ass skirt. By the way, hi, I’m Dean.”

            There are so many elements about that statement that anger Raphael, from Dean’s cocky smirk to his casual insistence that God is responsible for Castiel’s resurrection. But the thing that angers him the most is Dean’s casual shortening of Castiel’s name, _Cas_.

            The suffix –el, which most angels carry on the end of their name, means _of God_ , and by stripping Castiel of that, Dean is symbolically stripping Castiel of his connection to the angels, something that he has already, incidentally, stripped Castiel of in a literal sense.

            Raphael may not hold any love for Castiel in particular, but the disrespect still rankles.

            “I know who you are,” is all Raphael says out loud. “And now, thanks to _him_ ,” he indicates Castiel, “I know _where_ you are.”

            “You won’t kill him,” Castiel says sharply. “You wouldn’t dare.”

            “But I will take him to Michael,” Raphael says, and it goes without saying that this is more or less the same thing. Michael tends to be even more careless with his vessels than Raphael is, and if Dean is even left alive after Michael uses his body to defeat Lucifer, he will be a vegetable.

            “Well then. Sounds terrifying, it does,” Dean says, the picture of casual. “But, uh, hate to tell you, I’m not going anywhere with you.” He completes his statement by grabbing a can of beer, though his body language suggests that he is still on guard.

            “Surely you remember Zachariah giving you stomach cancer?” Raphael asks. He certainly does; it seems that Zachariah has not stopped talking about it since.

            Dean grimaces. “Yeah, that was – that was hilarious.”

            “Well, he doesn’t have anything close to my imagination,” Raphael says. The _or my power_ goes unsaid, because even if Dean doesn’t fully understand the meaning of the word _archangel_ , he can surely understand the storm that is raging directly outside the cabin, all of Raphael’s making.

            It seems Dean doesn’t give up, though. “Yeah? I bet you didn’t imagine one thing.”

            “What?” Raphael says. He does not think anything Dean has to say will surprise him.

            It does, though, and Raphael will return to this moment in the future, time and time again, wondering how he could have been so blind. “We knew you were coming, you stupid son of a bitch,” Dean says, flicking on a lighter and dropping it at his feet. the holy oil in a circle on the floor ignites, trapping Raphael neatly inside.

            Raphael can only imagine the look on his face right now, the shock and fury. Dean seems to notice, because he quirks his lips and says, “Don’t look at me, it was his idea,” pointing to Castiel.

            Castiel either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care. “Where is he?” he asks, intensely single-minded, and Raphael cannot help the bitter laugh he gives in return.

            “God?” he says. “Didn’t you hear? He’s dead, Castiel. Dead.” It’s blasphemy of the highest order, but Raphael takes the fact that no one smites him on the spot to be proof of his hypothesis. Castiel looks stricken, horrified, and Raphael almost feels bad for a second, until he looks down at the flames licking at the oil around his feet. “There’s no other explanation. He’s gone for good.”

            “You’re lying,” Castiel says.

            “Am I?” Raphael raises a questioning eyebrow at him, reveling in the fact that Castiel seems rattled, less sure than he’d like to be. “Do you remember the twentieth century? Think the twenty-first is going any better? Do you think God would have let any of that happen if he were alive?” War. Holocaust. The atomic bomb. Raphael had lived through it all, seen it all, and though the death and suffering of millions of humans hadn’t affected him personally, he remembers how much God had loved the humans, his flawed little pets, and he cannot imagine God having the same reaction as him.

            “Oh yeah?” Dean says, and Raphael wonders if he is even intelligent enough to know about these things. “Well then who invented the Chinese basket trick?”

            “Careful,” Raphael warns, because even if God is gone for good, there are some lines he cannot cross, some codes of behavior that are engrained in him. “That’s my father you’re talking about, boy.”

            “Yeah,” Dean snorts. “Who would be _so proud_ to know his sons started the frigging Apocalypse.”

            “Who ran off and disappeared,” Raphael counters. “Who left no instructions and a world to run.” Privately, he’s not convinced that the Apocalypse is the best way to do this, but he’s hardly about to give Dean the satisfaction of saying so.

            “Daddy ran away and disappeared,” Dean says mockingly. “He didn’t happen to work for the post office, did he?”

            Raphael doesn’t understand what he means by that, but judging from the way Castiel, who has been wound tight since he stepped into the room, relaxes a little at the words, he does.

            “This is funny to you?” Raphael demands. “You’re living in a Godless universe.” Ancient humans would be soundly horrified at the idea, but Dean doesn’t even seem affected.

            “And?” he says. “What, you and the other kids just decided to throw an Apocalypse while he was gone?”

            “We’re tired,” Raphael says, and he thinks he’s never spoken truer words in his entire existence. “We just want it to be over. We just want…paradise.”

            “So what,” Dean says. His fists are clenched and he’s clearly not going to back down on this argument, no matter how petty and futile it is. “God dies and makes you the boss, and you decide you can do anything you want?”

            “Yes,” Raphael says simply. He is bored with this conversation. “And whatever we want, we get.”

            Though the ring of holy fire dampens his power, makes it impossible for him to manipulate the world around him in the way he ordinarily might, Raphael can still do some things. Concentrating, he uses his power to shatter the windows. The glass bursts inwards, allowing the howling wind and stinging raindrops to come inside.

            As soon as this happens, Castiel moves, shielding Dean with his body. It’s a disgusting display of loyalty, and Raphael is sick of it. He’d felt badly killing Castiel the first time, but now he thinks he would not hesitate. Castiel is clearly warped, broken, his time spent with the humans making him less than an angel. It would be an act of mercy to kill him, to put him down like a rabid dog.

            Castiel straightens up and turns back to Raphael, eyes squinted against the maelstrom. “If God is dead, why have I returned?” he says, shouting to pitch his voice over the storm. “Who brought me back?”

            “Did it ever occur to you that maybe Lucifer raised you?” Raphael says. Even if he did not know that Lucifer was incapable of such a thing, he would doubt it. Castiel is clearly loyal to Dean, and Lucifer would never bring him back to life just to assist Michael’s true vessel.

            “No,” Castiel says, and Raphael can tell he’s being entirely honest; he has never even thought that it might not be God who raised him.

            “Think about it. He needs all the rebellious angels he can find,” Raphael says. He barely even knows why he’s doing this, besides that he’s angry, so angry, at Dean and Castiel and his brothers and the humans and his Father and _everything_. “You know it adds up.”

            Castiel glares at him, eyes hard. “Let’s go,” he says to Dean, shortly.

            Raphael does not want to be left in this circle. “Castiel, I’m warning you,” he says. “Do not leave me here. I will find you.”

            Castiel pauses on his way to the door and turns around, studying Raphael. “Maybe one day,” he concedes. “But today, you’re my little bitch.”

            He sweeps out of the room without a word, and Dean follows after him, pausing only to fire a, “What he said!” over his shoulder at Raphael, looking impressed at Castiel’s daring.

            It takes Raphael an hour to loosen the roof of the cabin enough for the wind to blow it off and the driving rain to extinguish the holy fire. By that point, Dean and Castiel are long gone, hidden from his view, and Raphael returns to Heaven, fuming, leaving his vessel in the ruined cabin without care.

            One day, he vows to himself, Castiel will pay for that.

***

           “Raphael!” Michael called to his brother. “Raphael, come with us!”

            From where he’d paused to contemplate a small portion of his Father’s Heaven, Raphael looked ahead to the six shining beings that were his closest companions.

            Had he been corporeal, he would have smiled as he caught up with them, ready for whatever adventure would come next.


	4. The Book of Gabriel

[28]

I had been thinking of Gabriel,

of the moon-cycle, of the moon-shell,

 

of the moon-crescent

and the moon at full:

 

I had been thinking of Gabriel,

the moon-regent, the Angel,

 

and I had intended to recall him

in the sequence of candle and fire

 

and the law of the seven;

I had not forgotten

 

his special attribute

of annunciator; I had thought

 

to address him as I had the others,

Uriel, Annael;

 

how could I imagine

the Lady herself would come instead?

***

            Gabriel wasn’t planning to meet the Vessels when he rolled up to a small college town in Ohio in late winter, 2006. In fact, he didn’t really have a plan at all, besides the vague idea that a certain lecherous college professor needed to be taken down a peg or two.

            It’s a lonely life, one Gabriel’s been leading since he lost the last semblance of a family that he’d known, but it’s one that keeps the pain at bay. It keeps away that niggling little voice in the back of his mind, the one that says that there’s a common denominator in the two tales of his lost family, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out what it is.

            Anyway, Gabriel doesn’t have a plan when he gets sick of a fifteen year jag in and around Cabo and decides to go and mete out a little well-deserved justice, but he’s always disliked people who are skeevy about sex (like, _actually_ skeevy, not his signature so-cheesy-that-it’s-charming schtick; he never goes after people who are _underage,_ at least). So when he hears about the professor, from the slightly too-loud and too-shrill conversation that a couple of college girls are having to his left, he gives a sharp salute to the man he’s been spending the last week with and disappears, leaving behind a little mojo to wipe the man’s memory before he finds himself standing in front of the picturesque little university.

            Humans are easy to fool, have always been easy to fool, and Gabriel’s plan evolves as he gets a job at the school, one of those menial jobs that most humans overlook. It’s only a few weeks before he’s got the dick professor in question taking an unintentional swan dive out of his office window after a meeting with a particularly gruesome apparition.

            Though his main job is done, Gabriel hangs out for a bit, half-heartedly scoping out a new target (he’s found that there’s never a shortage when frat boys are involved). The truth is, he’s restless, has been kicking around the earth for about ten centuries with fuck-all to do. Even archangels can only take so much aimless wandering, can only take so much time with only their creations for company.

            It is, of course, very soon after Gabriel thinks this that a very distinctive car rolls into town, and Gabriel is afforded the dubious honor of occupying the same town as the Vessels.

            He shouldn’t do anything, really, because the last thing he wants is for the Apocalypse to actually happen. But Gabriel has always been curious to a fault, and he decides to meddle a little, decides to get the measure of the men whose chosen purposes have been known to the Seven for centuries.

            And if this meddling includes a little bit of fucking with their heads, well, what can Gabriel say? He’s spent a long time in character, after all.

            He’s dealt with these hunter types before and they’re nothing if not predictable, so he’s not all that surprised when the two of them come to speak to the “janitor”.

            Gabriel _could_ send them on their way, but he’s interested to see how quickly they figure him out, if at all, so he plants a few hints, tells them about the girl he’d planted and how she _never came out again_!

            Right away, he can tell who’s the brains of this operation. Oh, Dean’s not _stupid_ , though being a vessel doesn’t exactly necessitate intelligence, but he’s got the street-smart thing going on, while little Sammy busts out the intellect.

            And when Gabriel looks at Sam, this kid who can’t be more than twenty three or twenty four years old, he sees so much of Lucifer that it’s scary.

            The wide smile and guileless eyes were never Lucifer’s style, but there’s a darkness in Sam, a bit of sneakiness and ruthlessness that Gabriel remembers, that were never obvious to him until after the Fall. And that’s without even taking into account the demon blood, the physical stain on his soul that Gabriel can see whenever he looks at him.

            Dean, on the other hand, doesn’t remind Gabriel much of Michael, at least at first. It’s probably the sarcasm – Michael had never had much of a sense of humor, and what little had been there had disappeared long ago.

            It still makes Gabriel uncomfortable to be around them for too long, dredging up feelings that he hasn’t allowed himself to have in over two thousand years, and this is why he’s so damn hard on them.

            It was hard to give up his angel instincts and go pagan, but he’s managed to circumvent much of the guilt by making up his own rules, the strictest of which is that he only messes with dicks. Even though the Winchesters are certainly cramping his style just by being here, they can’t exactly be called dicks. In fact, they’re pretty much the opposite extreme: they are, after all, just trying to help.

            But they’re codependent, too codependent, and Gabriel thinks this whole Apocalypse clusterfuck will go down a little smoother if they stop liking each other so damn much.

            It’s easy to see what buttons to push – Sam’s got a little brother complex a mile wide, can’t abide Dean’s habit of treating him like a kid, and is neurotic about his things besides. As for Dean, from the moment that big black gas guzzler roars into the parking lot of the school, Gabriel knows how to get to _him_.

            He’s not expecting them to call in reinforcements, but Bobby Singer is hardly a threat to Gabriel’s existence, just his plan.

            He sits in the apartment he’s been using (the guy who previously lived there had “moved”, by which Gabriel means that he’d been driven insane by the ghost of the girl he had once strangled to death), surrounded by candy and absentmindedly patting the stray dog he’d rescued from Death Row at the local animal shelter.

            He feels out of sorts. He’s gotten good at hiding his feelings, even from himself since leaving Heaven and, to a lesser extent, since the Fall itself. This whole Winchester business is throwing him off his game, though. They’re too close, too connected to the family he’d left behind, but he can’t bring himself to leave. Not just yet.

            In order to get his mind off of things, he conjures himself up a little fun. What’s the use of being all-powerful if you don’t use it for good?

***

            The next day heralds the return of the Winchesters to Gabriel’s humble university abode, and he decides to use up the time that they spend stumbling around being incapable of finding their own asses with both hands being as inappropriate as humanly possible.

            “Sorry I’m dragging a little ass today, boys,” Gabriel says as he unlocks the gate that will allow them into Crawford Hall. “Had quite the night last night. Lots of sex, if you catch my drift.”

            “Yeah, hard not to,” Dean says, as though he has class or standards or something. “Listen, we won’t be long. We just need to check a couple offices up on three.”

            Gabriel can’t think of any conceivable reason why they would need to do that, but hey. He’s not about to be the angel on their freakishly large shoulders, here; they can fail at figuring out what’s going on all by themselves.

            “No problem,” he says, and then Sam gives a very theatrical full-body jerk.

            “I, uh, forgot something in the truck,” he says, in a tone of voice that makes Gabriel suspect that he did not, in fact, forget anything in any truck. “You know what? I’ll catch up with you guys.”

            “Okay,” Dean says, and Gabriel, resisting the urge to roll his eyes at how freaking obvious they’re being, leads Dean upstairs to the third floor offices.

            It’s quite obvious as soon as they get there that Dean is at a loss as to what to do to pretend that he’s still examining things, instead of serving as a decoy while Sam attempts to get proof that Gabriel is the supernatural creature they’re dealing with. Naturally, this means that Gabriel does not leave Dean to his snooping, and instead chooses to park himself right by the door and continue their conversation from downstairs, with loud and graphic descriptions of exactly what had gone on between himself and the beautiful women from last night.

            Dean seems to be trying his best to tune Gabriel out, but gets increasingly crabby as Gabriel goes on.

            “So, anyway, the brunette one, right?” Gabriel says, smirking as Dean runs a stubbornly silent EMF meter around the deserted office for the third time. “I think her name was Magdalena, she was Spanish, real feisty, you know, and –”

            “Alright!” Dean interrupts, standing up straight (or as straight as his bowlegs will allow him to stand). “We’re done here. Thanks for this.”

            Closet case, Gabriel decides as he watches Dean go down the stairs, following at a safe distance. Probably prone to overcompensation and exaggeration of his own sexual exploits; doesn’t know how to handle it when someone beats him at his own game. Not much like Michael, then, but the comparison was never going to be perfect; after all, John Winchester was not really comparable to God in the father category, and growing up as a hunter’s kid isn’t comparable to being an angel.

            Gabriel stops at the third floor landing and peers out the window, watching as Dean comes out of the building and meets his brother. They appear to be in an argument, and, if Gabriel focuses, he can hear them perfectly.

            “Just ’cause he reads the Weekly World News doesn’t mean he’s our guy,” Sam is saying, sounding as though he’s made this same argument countless times. “You read it, too.”

            A man after Gabriel’s heart, Dean is. “I’m telling you, it’s him,” Dean argues, stubborn.

            “Look, I just think we need some hard proof, that’s all,” Sam says, and Gabriel blinks, surprised despite himself. Not a perfect correlation, he reminds himself, but Lucifer’s lack of regard for others, lack of empathy, is so legendary that it catches him off guard to see that Sam doesn’t show the same trait. After all, Gabriel’s given more than enough information for them to be reasonably sure that he’s the culprit, and of what he is (or rather, what he’s pretending to be). Hell, most people, not just evil bastards like Lucifer, would get all stab-happy for less; Dean certainly seems to have no problem with the idea, although that may be partly due to having spent the last two hours or so in Gabriel’s company.

            “Another thing Bobby mentioned was that these suckers have a metabolism like an insect, a real sweet tooth,” Dean says.

            “I didn’t find any candy bars or sugar. Not even Equal,” Sam argues, and damn, this kid is really looking for a reason _not_ to murder Gabriel, isn’t he? Gabriel supposes he should be grateful, but this means that there’s a possibility that he’d misjudged Sam, and if there’s one thing Gabriel absolutely cannot stand, it’s being wrong.

            “Probably missed something,” Dean says, sounding every inch the dismissive older brother, that sort of benevolent mistrust that family members are often so good at conveying.

            “I don’t miss things,” Sam shoots back.

            “Oh, right, ’cause you’re Mr. Perfect,” Dean says. Gabriel doesn’t think much of his insults, but he is starting to feel a faint sense of pride. Nothing better than sowing a little chaos, after all.

            “What?” Sam sounds genuinely shocked. “Are you still pissed at me ’cause of what the Trickster did?”

            “You been a tight ass long before that Trickster showed up,” Dean says, and Gabriel’s treacherous brain adds _oh, I just bet_.

            Sam doesn’t take the bait, letting out a practiced, put-upon sigh. “Look, just…stay here, keep an eye on the janitor. I’ll go to his place to see if I can find any actual evidence before you go barging in and staking the man! Just wait till I get back, okay? _Okay?_ ”

            “Okay!” Dean snaps back, and Sam leaves, shaking his head and walking more quickly than he ordinarily might.

            Gabriel spares a second to wonder how Sam knows where he’s been staying, but he decides he categorically does not give a fuck, because if his week-long observation of the vessels has yielded any fruit, it’s the fact that Dean Winchester is far too fucking impatient to wait for Sam to come back. He’s like a particularly poorly-trained Rottweiler, that one, absolutely no impulse control. When he inevitably decides to come after Gabriel, Gabriel’s going to be ready.

            A thought, and then he’s in the building’s cavernous auditorium, a remnant from when Crawford Hall had also housed the university’s theatre program. Without missing a beat, he gets to work, modeling the stage after what might feature in one of his own fantasies: round bed, the two girls from last night. The disco ball is a last-minute touch, mostly because he likes being as over-the-top as possible, and not so much because he thinks Dean will enjoy it.

            He makes himself, invisible, then, and lies in wait, counting down the seconds until Dean shows up. As an afterthought, he puts on some music, cheesy to match the disco ball. He needs to draw Dean towards him, after all.

            Sure enough, it’s not ten minutes before Dean rounds the corner, walking into the auditorium and taking in the sight that the girls make on the bed. “We’ve been waiting for you, Dean,” one of them calls.

            To his credit, Dean doesn’t react exactly like Gabriel had been expecting; he actually puts up resistance. “Y-y-you guys aren’t real,” he stutters out.

            “Trust me, sugar, it’s gonna feel real,” the brunette apparition purrs. Dean still looks nervous, and Gabriel wonders if he should have made one of them male. Might push old Dean-o towards some important personal revelations, in any case.

            “Come on. Let us give you a massage,” the blonde apparition joins in the wheedling now, crawling towards the front of the bed in a way that puts her quite impressive breasts on full display.

            “You know, I’m a – I’m a sucker for a happy ending,” Dean says. “Really, I am, but…I-I’m gonna have to pass.”

            Fuck it, Gabriel decides, and makes himself visible. “They’re a peace offering,” he says loudly from his place sitting atop one of the plush auditorium seats. “I know what you and your brother do. I’ve been around a while. Run into your kind before.” It’s not, strictly speaking, true, in either of the senses he means it. He’s always managed to escape any hunter that caught onto his trail without breaking a sweat, and has never even gotten as far as talking to them; as for the other type, the “God’s chosen” type – well, no one’s ever been chosen in quite the same way as the Winchesters, that’s for damn sure.

            “Well, then you know that I can’t let you just keep hurting people,” Dean says. Gabriel wonders what it must be like to see the world in such stark black and white, to be able to classify someone as a monster and deserving of death just because they’re supernatural. Sure, Gabriel passes his own judgment, but it’s always on a case-by-case basis. That idea doesn’t even seem like it’s ever occurred to Dean. It seems he’s never thought that a supernatural creature could be _helpful_ , could be getting rid of the world’s riff-raff and actually making it a better place to be for everyone.

            “Come on!” he says, wondering if he’ll be able to get that idea through Dean’s thick skull. Probably not, but it can’t hurt to try. “Those people got what was coming to them. Hoisted on their own petards. But you and Sam – I like you. I do. So treat yourself…long as you want. Just long enough for me to move on to the next town.”

            “Yeah, I don’t think I can let you do that,” Dean says, predictably enough.

            “I don’t want to hurt you. And you know that I can.” Dean doesn’t know the half of it, actually. Tricksters and pagans can’t explode someone with a thought from across the room. Tricksters and pagans can’t go back in time and make sure a person was never born.

            Gabriel can. Or, Gabriel _could_ , if it wasn’t for the whole one true vessel thing.

            “Look, man,” Dean says, and Gabriel is suddenly struck by how goddamn _funny_ this is, two beings, more alike in their habits than either of them would like to think about, trying in vain to convince the other of a position on which they are diametrically opposed, simply by virtue of their birth, their very being. “I got to tell you, I dig your style, all right? I mean, I do. The slow dancing alien…”

            “One of my personal favorites,” Gabriel says, because you might not know it to look at him, but if there’s one thing he’s passionate about, it’s punishing sexists. Annael’s left over influence, probably, though he doesn’t like to think about her any more than he likes to think about any of his other siblings.

            “But, uh, I can’t let you go,” Dean continues.

            “Too bad. Like I said, I like you,” Gabriel says. “Sam was right. You shouldn’t have come alone.” He’s contemplating sending Dean halfway across the world, maybe to Europe, because everything about the man screams Americana and it couldn’t hurt him to get a little fucking culture. Sam would probably weep with joy, after discovering where Dean was, of course.

            “Well, I’ll agree with you there,” Dean says, an infuriating smirk playing around his lips, and the door to the auditorium slams shut. Gabriel looks up and sees both Sam and Bobby Singer, wielding those damn stakes that they think will kill him. They’re not anything threatening to him, really, just little pieces of wood, but their shapes are so familiar, the way they are held out in front of them so painful, that Gabriel can’t help the surge of fear that goes through him.   

            “That fight you guys had outside…” Gabriel says slowly, the pieces fitting together in his head. “That was a trick? Hmm. Not bad. But you want to see a real trick?” he snaps his fingers, and a masked figure with a chainsaw appears behind Sam, while the female apparitions on the stage suddenly turn on Dean, the brunette punching him so hard that he goes down instantly.

            Gabriel has full control over his apparitions, so he holds back a bit, causing the chainsaw to just miss any time it comes near Sam or Bobby, making the women just a bit slower and weaker than he ordinarily might.

            It’s still incredibly satisfying, watching the melee. Gabriel doesn’t like being tricked, doesn’t really like competition at his own game, and although the Winchesters’ little deception won’t actually have an effect on his existence, it’s still galling.

            After a few moments, though, Gabriel realizes that they’ve reached a stalemate. He can’t kill them, even if he wanted to or felt justified in doing so, and they certainly can’t kill him, but they won’t believe that if he tells them. There’s only one way this can really end, and Gabriel uses one of his favorite tricks to make it happen. Using much the same power he used to make his apparitions, he fashions a quick clone of himself, imbibing it with enough power to walk and talk and make snarky comments, and then he makes himself invisible again, leaving the clone behind in the seat.

            If any of the hunters had been watching him as he did this, even without the distraction of a fight, they wouldn’t have noticed anything. Gabriel has great power, more so than any other supernatural being they have ever met in their entire lives, and that’s not him being vain – he’s an apex predator, top of the food chain. Only a few forces in the universe that can put a dent in him.

            Humans, even ones that are destined to carry his brothers around in their skin one day, aren’t one of those forces.

            The Gabriel clone continues to cheer on the melee, but Gabriel’s lack of attention to his apparitions means that Sam has a split second advantage that allows him to toss his stake to Dean, who fights his way through the still-attacking women to drive the stake deep into the clone’s heart, twisting it a little to deepen the wound.

            The clone does a perfect impression of the death of a pagan god (Gabriel would know, he’s witnessed enough of their deaths for a lifetime), and the Winchesters and Bobby are free to go, thinking that they’ve learned a valuable lesson about being nice to each other or whatever, thinking they’ve triumphed over the forces of evil once again.

            As they roar away in their car, Gabriel manifests again, getting rid of the ruined clone with an absent-minded wave of his hand. He doesn’t envy the Winchesters the days that are coming, knows that their shit childhood and Daddy issues are child’s play compared to what will happen when the forces of Heaven get their meathooks deep into them.

            He feels sorrier for himself, though, as cowards like him usually do, and he flies away without a thought, going on to the next town. There are always dicks to be punished; after all, his work is never done, and it’ll sure as Hell make him feel better to kill something right now.

***

            Gabriel was young, relatively speaking, when Lucifer fell. Sure, he was one of the Seven, one of the earliest beings to ever be created, but time has less meaning when you have so much of it. Gabriel, the coddled one, the one for whom God had a Plan, was seen as the younger brother to almost all the other angels. Even Lucifer.

            Especially Lucifer.

            The Morningstar was radiant, no one would ever deny that, but some were more attracted to his radiance than others, and the only one of the angels more drawn to him than Gabriel was Michael.

It wasn’t all bad, in the beginning – Gabriel feels like he has to qualify large chunks of his existence like that, it wasn’t all bad, I didn’t mean for it to go so wrong, I don’t even know what happened – when it was just God and the Seven and the lower orders of angels and the primordial life forms on Earth.

            And then humanity happened, and a latent part of Lucifer – a part that Gabriel has always thought must have been obvious from the beginning, to those of them who weren’t blinded by his brilliance – began to emerge, a rebellious part. There were fights, as much as a mere angel, not even an archangel, can fight with God, and things went from bad to worse when God refused to back down on the idea of humanity.

            Because, see, Gabriel was told about humanity from the beginning, told about God’s plan for them and something called free will.

            “It’ll happen like this, Gabriel,” God would say, fixing his attention on Gabriel in a way that made Gabriel feel so, so loved and important. “I will create these creatures who are not born to obey me, who are able to make their own choices. For you angels are my children, are _wonderful_ , but there is only so much that such devoted beings can do. No, these creatures, these _humans_ , will be the creators, will be able to make the universe wonderful.”

            “But if they do not obey you, then won’t they act against your will? Won’t they sin?” Gabriel would ask, fearful at the very thought.

            God would radiate gentleness back at him, like the kindly Father he so rarely was, and he would say, “Ah, but that is where you will come in, Gabriel. I have a plan for them, and a plan for you.”

            Those words would never fail to warm Gabriel up inside, to instill him with the sort of fierce sense of purpose that he hasn’t felt since then. He had never told any of the other angels, not even the other members of the Seven about these meetings, preferring to keep them close to himself. Maybe he had been arrogant, as he had been so, so many times since then.

            Gabriel didn’t know that none of the other angels were in on the idea of humanity until God had already started to put his plan into motion. The resulting arguments ended with Lucifer choosing to Fall to earth, to lead battle against God’s new chosen people.

            The effects on Heaven were catastrophic. Several more angels Fell, though none so spectacularly as Lucifer, and even among the ones who chose to stay, there was dissent. Among the Seven, once the closest group in all of Heaven, fights broke out: Uriel arguing for Lucifer’s side as much as he could without Falling himself; Michael railing against him, asking _how, how could you do this to our Father_ while meaning _how could Lucifer do this to me_ ; Annael using her gift to try to keep the peace; Zadkiel retreating into a corner, silent; Raphael changing sides almost by the minute; Azrael just that little bit aside, above the arguments in the way he had always been; and Gabriel.

            Gabriel, seeing for the first time what it was like not to be the coddled one, seeing his brothers savagely fight each other while ignoring him, ignoring and adding to the pain that the loss of Lucifer had caused.

            And then, when the tension became unbearable, God’s order to Michael: strike Lucifer down, lock him away – he is no longer one of us but a different creature entirely. He disobeyed, and he must pay the price.

            Their God, all -knowing but never cruel, in his first deliberate act of cruelty, choosing the being who loved Lucifer above all others for the job.

            And Michael had obeyed, of course Michael had obeyed, because the alternative was being struck down as well, and the very idea is abhorrent to all that angels are.

As a result, Azrael left Heaven – though he didn’t Fall as Lucifer had, simply melted away one day when Gabriel wasn’t quite paying attention. Gabriel longed to do the same, because his heart was broken, perhaps beyond repair, and staying in Heaven was causing him to become sullen and argumentative, causing flare-ups with Annael and snapping at the lesser angels.

            The day he first made a Cupid cry was the day that he first took a vessel.

            It was strange, folding himself into a human form for the first time. He knew the theory of the matter, of course: it was innate in every angel. But it felt more limiting than he had expected, like everything about him was muffled, less in contact with the world.

            He sat up, looking around. His vessel was an older man, going grey around the temples, not much in the way of human standards of beauty, but he was a devout man, and Gabriel didn’t much care. He didn’t bother to sit up and look around at his surroundings, choosing instead to take to wing.

            He’d gotten his vessel from one of the Jewish communities, one of those that followed his Father, and he didn’t actually want any part of that: what was the use of escaping from Heaven if he was just going to hear about it all the damn time?

            No, Gabriel’s goal was simpler. More…primitive, as it were.

            All of the angels had heard of the pagan gods, minor deities who had sprung up out of humankind’s own stubbornness. They had long been a source of outrage for the other angels: how dare they appropriate the name of their Father? These beings were less powerful than all but the lowest angels, and they depended on their human worshippers to stay alive and in power.

            Gabriel had to do a bit of research before settling down. There were so many pagan gods – each separate pocket of human civilization seemed to have their own.

            There were the Egyptians, but Gabriel didn’t think he’d look very good with an animal head, so they were out. He was more of a dog person than a cat person, anyway, and besides, the whole Isis-Osiris-Set-Horus thing was all kinds of fucked up; he didn’t want to get in the middle of _that_.

            Then there were the Greeks, and their low-rent rip-off counterparts, the Romans. Tempting, because there were so many gods and titans and elements and humans-become-gods that no one would question it if he were to show up, but one meeting with Hermes cured Gabriel of any inclination to hang out with them, and hot as Aphrodite was, there was a little too much swan rape for him.

            The South American deities were too bloodthirsty, the North American too abstract, the East Asian too specific. He liked the style of the Hindus, really but in the end, there was really only one choice: the Norse.

            So he did the sneaky thing: he inserted himself into their pantheon. It was easier than one might think. Fake giant parents, a little blood swapping, and Bob’s your uncle – he was a full-on Norse god.

            The god of mischief, the trickster god. It was appropriate, given the trick he was pulling off here. Loki, the name he fashioned for himself, was about as far from Gabriel as it was possible to get.

            He didn’t abandon Heaven entirely, though, and throughout the ages he got good at maintaining this double life, good at kicking back with the Norse and playing tricks on people, and then going back to Heaven and playing the good son.

            It all worked out, really, until that whole “you have a purpose, Gabriel’ thing came back to bite him in the ass.

            See, God was ,among many other things, kind of a remote and mysterious bastard, so Gabriel had never really been able to suss out exactly what this huge destiny was.

            It was a nondescript day, and Gabriel was in Heaven. He hadn’t been able to escape to the Norse in quite a while, and it showed – though angels were, of course, incorporeal in Heaven, any angel would be able to tell that Gabriel was restless.

            As a result, the rest of them were giving him a rather wide berth. It suited Gabriel, really: Thor had been particularly irritating lately, and Gabriel was determined that his next trick would really be one for the books.

            Then it began, the sort of rolling feeling in his Grace, the one that meant that God wanted him. Gabriel hadn’t felt it so strongly since the days immediately following Lucifer’s Fall, and so his immediate reaction was fear: the kind of bone-deep fear that such a powerful being rarely felt.

            Still, that was a time when Gabriel was still utterly beholden to his God, wouldn’t have disobeyed him for anything, so he followed his instincts, that tugging sensation, and appeared before his Father.

            It was hard to describe exactly what God was, how he differed from the angels, because they were all incorporeal, all beings composed of light and intent and virtue. Still, God was somehow _more_ , somehow all-encompassing and all-knowing, and even the most inexperienced human would have been able to tell the difference between God and his children.

            “Gabriel,” God said, his voice more of a feeling than a sound, overwhelming without being painful. “It is time.”

            And Gabriel knew what he was talking about, because Gabriel had been groomed for this from the moment of his creation. Despite himself, despite the part of him that was becoming more pagan by the day, Gabriel felt the old excitement come back, the devotion of the days before the Fall. Finally, _finally_ , he would know what it was, the mission that had been alluded to in half-truths and nudging asides. Finally, he would do what he was created to do.

***

            Gabriel touched down in Nazareth, a small town on the upper part of the Palestinian peninsula, the instructions from God running through his head. They didn’t make much sense to him, but then, they didn’t really have to. All he knew was that he had to find a specific woman and make an announcement to her, an announcement that would change both her life and the course of humanity’s existence forever.

            In a sharp contrast to the vessel he’d used when he was among the Norse, his vessel this time was almost overwhelmingly beautiful, a fair-haired youth with high cheekbones and soulful eyes, the very picture of the Greeks’ Ganymede.

            The Heavenly light that burst out of him when Gabriel appeared to Mary of Nazareth in her humble home was, of course, all Gabriel’s own.

            God had chosen well for the vessel of his divine Savior. Mary behaved exactly as a devout woman should when Gabriel appeared to her, falling to her knees and bowing her head in prayer. In her soft, sweet voice, she asked why Gabriel was there, what purpose she could serve in God’s divine plan.

            When Gabriel told her, she risked a look up at him, her eyes shining with worship and hope. Though she was plain of face, Gabriel had never seen a human closer to the divine. He wanted to stay near her, to speak with her and find out how a member of humanity could possibly be so unequivocally _good_ , but he had his orders and he followed them to the letter.

***

            Though Gabriel was not allowed to appear to the humans after the Annunciation, he was rarely far from his charges afterwards. Oh, he went back to Heaven from time to time, tried to reconnect with those remaining members of the Seven, as well as with the lesser angels that he had once called companions, but the majority of his time was spent watching Mary, Joseph, and, after his birth, Jesus.

            Joseph was just as devout as Mary, not doubting her story for a moment even though he never received proof. The two of them raised Jesus just as God had hoped, and he grew into a strong, stalwart young man, full of the light of God. He travelled across Israel, often eschewing lavish methods of transportation in favor of his own two feet, and bestowed miracles on the unworthy, preaching God’s message to the people, one sinner at a time.

            Though they were never allowed to meet, Gabriel loved him immensely, and followed his every action with complete focus. Jesus’s triumphs were Gabriel’s triumphs, and his failures were Gabriel’s failures. When he amassed his followers, Gabriel rejoiced, and when he was turned away from a town, Gabriel raged.

            Gabriel watched as Jesus took on every test that God put to him, never once allowing his face to waver. Gabriel watched as Jesus, for he was a man like any other, in most ways, took a wife.

            Gabriel watched as, a paltry amount of time after his birth, one of Jesus’s closest companions betrayed him, and he was sentenced to die on the cross.

            Gabriel had no doubt that God would deliver his champion from this trial, just like he had delivered him of all others. He winced when Jesus was whipped, but remained strong. He suffered as the Marys, Jesus’s mother and wife, clung to each other and cried, watching the man they loved so much going through such pain and heartache.

            When Jesus was actually bound to the cross by the cruelly grinning Roman guards, Gabriel could not stand by any longer. He went to make himself visible, only to find himself, between one second and the next, back in Heaven, in the company of a very irate God.

            “I told you not to interfere,” God said, his voice calm even as his eyes blazed with fury.

            “They’re going to kill him!” Gabriel cried. “I can’t just watch that happen!”

            “You can,” God said. “You must.” God’s tone never left much room for argument, but Gabriel could only remember a few times before when he had sounded so completely authoritative.

            It was like the Fall all over again, looking at God and silently begging for him to be that forgiving Father that he claimed to be. Gabriel could feel the content of the last thirty years, his renewed sense of purpose, draining away.

            “But _why_?” Gabriel asked. He knew, of course, what the consequences for questioning God could be, but he could no longer bring himself to care. “He’s a good man, the _best_ you’ve ever created. If anyone deserves life and happiness, it’s him.”

            “This is the purpose he was created for,” God said.

            “ _Death?_ ” Gabriel shot back, no longer bothering to keep his voice down. He knew that many of the other angels had been alerted to the fight, and he could feel them on the edge of his consciousness, attempting to listen in. “Death in the cruelest way possible?”

            “Yes,” God said simply. “His purpose is to pay for the sins of humanity. Besides, his death will not be permanent, not really.”

            It's not a comfort. “But that’s not _fair_ ,” Gabriel argued. “He’s done nothing wrong, his entire life!”

            “He hasn’t,” God agreed. “In fact, he’s done everything right. That’s why it has to be him. It has to be an innocent sacrifice, to wipe away all the vice and evil inherent in humanity.”

            “The vice and evil that _you_ created?” Gabriel asked bitterly. He knew even as he said it that he had gone too far, but rather than feeling regretful or afraid, he began to feel a sense of triumph.

            “Enough!” God bellowed, his corporeal voice loud enough to shake the very foundation of Heaven. “If you continue to disobey me, Gabriel, you will go the way of Lucifer.”

            Throughout the entire conversation, Gabriel had been aware of what is going on down on Earth, with Jesus. He had suffered through each painful breath that he’d taken, felt the agony of the spear thrust through his side and the nails through his wrists and ankles. As God made his pronouncement, Jesus threw his head back, looked towards the sky, and took his final, rattling breath, too exhausted to keep fighting.

            The Roman guards checked to make sure he was dead, and then began to drive Jesus’s followers away. Mary Magdalene fell to the ground, her entire body heaving with sobs, and one of the soldiers, the one who had stuck his spear into her husband’s side, kicked at her viciously until she got up and shakily began to walk away, moving like a woman many times her age, her formerly straight back bowed under the weight of her grief.

            Ahead of her, Jesus’s mother was walking as slowly as possible, waiting for Mary to catch up. Gabriel suddenly recalled something God had said at the creation of humanity, that there would be three Marys who decided the course of history. He didn’t know who the third would be, not at that time, but he certainly didn’t envy her.

            “Fine,” Gabriel said coldly, turning to the being whom he could no longer think of as his father. He was numb, empty, completely uncaring of what would happen to him. “Good riddance.”

            And with that, he left Heaven, vowing never to return.

***

            The next time Gabriel meets the vessels, he’s in Broward County, having just dropped some bastard into a wormhole.

            He’s been feeling more…vengeful lately. He’s a little bit loath to admit it, but since the first time he met them, he’s been keeping tabs on Sam and Dean Winchester, and the outlook is not good.

            When that two-bit yellow-eyed son of a bitch, Azazel, had finally revealed his pathetic endgame and in the process gotten Sam killed, Gabriel hadn’t been too worried. He’s Lucifer’s true vessel, and if Gabriel knows one thing about Heaven, it’s that they’ll do anything to make sure their plans work out.

            No, Gabriel had been more worried about the abundance of demons that were about to be released into the world. Not that they’re any threat to _him_ , of course, because literally the only thing that can kill him is the blade of one of the Seven, but he doesn’t like them, anyway. Make his skin crawl, those dirty bastards with their black eyes and horrible faces, traveling around in clouds of thick smoke.

            But then, _but then_ , just when Gabriel thought that those two yahoos couldn’t get any fucking stupider, Dean had gone and sold his soul to resurrect Sam.

            It had taken everything Gabriel had, every bit of laissez-faire attitude that he’d built up over the millennia not to pop up right next to Dean and ask him what in the holy Hell he thought he was doing, and hadn’t he learned _anything_ from his alcoholic asshole of a father?

            So now, there they were, in a town that Gabriel is also occupying, and he certainly isn’t going to turn down the chance to antagonize them. They deserve it, the self-sacrificing, co-dependent douchebags.

            He cycles through a few ideas until he settles for the Groundhog Day thing. Sammy’s gonna have to get used to his brother dying eventually, and although Dean’ll bounce back from the demon deal like an emotionally stunted Lazarus, he sure as Hell won’t survive the Apocalypse, no matter what Michael promises him.

            Gabriel forces himself to stick around and watch Sam’s reaction the first time Dean dies. Sure, he knows, intellectually, that at least some of his usual targets must have people who care about them, who will mourn their passing, but he never watches the outcome, never cares enough to think past the original _wouldn’t it be funny if_ …

            And he almost calls the whole thing off when he sees Sam’s face twisted with grief as he sobs over the body of his brother, the greasy owner of the Mystery Spot hauling ass away from the scene as fast as he can. Gabriel has killed a lot of people, of course, but he has a highly developed sense of justice, and neither Sam nor Dean has done anything to deserve this.

            _Yet_ , Gabriel reminds himself, turning away from the brothers. They haven’t done anything yet, but they will, and if he can just convince Sam to let go, to understand that one day, his brother will be lost to him for real, then maybe, just maybe, he can stop this cycle, can keep the Michael and Lucifer battle royale part deux from happening.

            It’s not as though he’s _actually_ killing Dean, anyway, Gabriel thinks. _That_ would be a terrible idea, considering that the second that Dean’s soul left his body, a horde of demons and Hellhounds would descend upon it like flies to a…well, a corpse. And yeah, Gabriel could put those puppies to rest without breaking a metaphorical sweat, but he doesn’t exactly need to send up a “missing archangel here” beacon, not now.

            No, it’s child’s play to safely store Dean away, knocked out into dreamland, while he sends a cleverly made double around with Sam.

            He’s expecting Sam to figure it out after the first few days, or at least after the first few _weeks_ , but it appears that he’s underestimated the effects of grief on the intellect.

            Instead, Sam races around, trying everything he can to make it to midnight without Dean dying (not that _that_ would help, Sam’s not getting outta this without a confrontation), ignoring the almost literally anvil-sized hints that Gabriel’s leaving around. Seriously, what other being do they know who can a) control the fabric of time and space, and b) would actually drop a piano on someone?

            In the end, it’s a relatively small thing that catches Sam’s attention, and Gabriel finds himself pressed against a chain-link fence by a furious Sam, the Dean-double anxiously hovering around behind him and exhibiting such un-Dean-like restraint that Gabriel begins to question his double-making skills.

            Gabriel makes a token protest, partly because it fits the Trickster persona that he’ll have to slip back into, and partly because it’s rather fascinating how much Sam’s nostrils flare when he’s angry. His breathing also sounds like that of an angry rhinoceros.

            When Sam makes a reference to their last meeting, Gabriel’s well-developed sense of timing kicks right in and he drops the glamour around him with barely a thought, melting back into the appearance of his vessel.

            “Actually, bucko, you didn’t,” he says, smarmy and smug, and enjoys the pure shock on Sam’s face for all of ten seconds before Sam shoves him even harder into the fence and moves his trusty stake closer to Gabriel’s neck.

            “Why are you doing this?” Sam demands, voice low and furious.

            Gabriel forces himself into levity. “You’re kidding, right? You chuckleheads tried to kill me last time. Why _wouldn’t_ I do this?”

            “And Hassleback, what about him?” the Dean-double asks, instead of doing what it should and getting stab-happy. Gabriel’s really gotta work on that.

            “That putz?” Gabriel asks, assuming that this Hassleback must be the guy with the wormhole, since he’s the last person before Dean that he can remember screwing with. “He said he didn’t believe in wormholes, so I dropped him in one. Then you guys showed up. I made you the second you hit town.”

            “So this is fun for you? Killing Dean over and over again?” Sam asks. Both the hand at Gabriel’s collar and the one on the stake are trembling, and Gabriel fights down a fresh wave of guilt.

            He has to do this.

            “One, yes. It is fun,” he lies. “And two? This is _so_ not about killing Dean. This joke is on _you_ , Sam. Watching your brother die, every day? Forever?”

            “You son of a bitch,” Sam breathes back, seeming to forget that the useless Dean-clone is even there. Gabriel concurs with the assessment.

            “How long will it take you to realize?” Gabriel asks. He’s having trouble not pleading. “You can’t save your brother. No matter what.” Just like Gabriel can’t save _his_ brothers. Can’t save any of them.

            “Oh yeah?” Sam replies, challenging. “I kill you, this all ends now.”

            Part of Gabriel wants to say “do it,” wants to let Sam stab him and pretend to be dead, never cross paths with the damn Vessels again, stop being reminded of his own fubar’d family system.

            But he’s come this far. He pulls out all the stops, because he can’t have Sam suspecting he’s not what they think he is. “Hey, whoa!” he protests, squirming a little and casting a wary eye at Sam’s stake. “Okay, look. I was just playing around. You can’t take a joke, fine. You’re out of it. Tomorrow, you’ll wake up and it’ll be Wednesday. I swear.”

            “You’re lying,” Sam says, which, point. There’s that intellect that Gabriel’s been missing.

            “If I am, you know where to find me. Having pancakes at the diner.”

            Sam and the Dean-clone exchange a look. “No. Easier just to kill you.”

            “Sorry, kiddo,” Gabriel says. He sounds flippant, but he means it, if not in the way that Sam thinks. “Can’t have that.” He barely remembers to do the snapping thing that he does to signal to humans that he’s doing _magic_ , and melts into thin air before Sam can react.

***

            This is it, the final act, Gabriel’s _coup de Grace_ , and it might just be the cruelest thing that he’s ever done to anyone.

            He allows Sam to wake up, to have his last moment with the Dean-clone, allows him to exclaim over the date and declare “Back in Time” the most beautiful song he’s ever heard, much to the chagrin of the Dean-clone, who Gabriel has at least managed to infused with the real Dean’s taste in music.

            Then he sends one of the locals after the clone with a shotgun. Might as well get some narrative symmetry in there: the first death equals the last.

            He doesn’t stick around, not this time. If he’s going to keep his resolve, he’s gotta let Sam stew by himself for a while.

            It’s a long six months. It’s true that Gabriel could skip to the end of the timeline he’d altered easily, but it seems that his time on earth hasn’t stomped the angelic martyr-complex out of him, and he lives every single day along with Sam, allowing himself to be seen every once in a while, just often enough for Sam to keep up the hope of finding him.

            He means to go a year, actually, but Sam descends into darkness much more quickly than Gabriel had anticipated, becoming a one-man killing machine within a few weeks.

            For his final cruelty, Gabriel masks himself as Bobby Singer, that gruff hunter that he’d met before, the last person on this earth that Sam can be said to care about. He sets up the room, in a dilapidated building back in Broward County, as though he’s about to perform a ritual, although the sigils that he draws are meaningless.

            When Sam comes in, he tries, one last time to find the humanity in him, sweeping Sam into a hug in Bobby’s borrowed arms.

            Sam’s stiff as a plank, doesn’t move to hug back, and Gabriel realizes with a chill that he’d extended more affection towards Gabriel himself six months ago than he does now to his father-figure.

            Gabriel wants to grab Sam’s ridiculous shoulders and shake him, now that his body is actually tall enough to do so, wants to shout _what would Dean say if he could see you now? Do you think he’d_ thank _you for this?_

            He doesn’t, though, just goes through with his plan, and it’s disgustingly easy to get Sam to agree to kill an innocent person, just a little bit harder to get Sam to agree to kill Bobby.

            When it comes down to it, though, it seems that Sam has that little spark of intellect still left buried underneath his revenge obsession, because he brings out that fucking stake again, thinking he’s being all stealthy about it, even though Gabriel can see it coming a mile away.

            Without skipping a beat, Gabriel slips out of the Bobby-glamour, leaving a clone in his place just in time for Sam to shove the stake deep into the Bobby-clone’s back, twisting it cruelly and snarling “Because you’re not Bobby,” a look of savage triumph on his ordinarily handsome face.

            When the corpse doesn’t vanish, or change into his form, or whatever Sam had been expecting it to do, Sam begins to panic, and a sense of relief runs through Gabriel.

            “Bobby? Bobby! Bobby!” Sam yells, and Gabriel can’t keep this up anymore, so he makes the corpse vanish and summons Sam’s stake from across the room (it won’t kill him, but it doesn’t feel _nice_ ).

            “You’re right, I was just screwing with you,” Gabriel says, barely paying attention to the words he’s saying. All he can think is that Sam’s not Lucifer, that even Dean’s death can’t completely extinguish his humanity, his innate goodness, and that maybe there’s actually a chance in Hell that this won’t end in blood and tears. “Pretty good, though, Sam. Smart. Let me tell you, whoever said Dean was the dysfunctional one has never seen you with a sharp object in your hands. Holy Full Metal Jacket.”

            “Bring him back,” is Sam’s only reply, and Gabriel’s in a good enough mood to roll his eyes. One track mind still intact, then.

            “Who, Dean? Didn’t my girl send you flowers? Dean’s dead. He ain’t coming back. His soul’s downstairs doing the Hellfire rumba as we speak.” He feels badly heaping that little bit of pain back on Sam, but Dean’s still gonna get dragged down to Hell in a few months, Gabriel can’t stop that, and any little thing that can prepare Sam will help.

            “Just take us back to that Tuesday – Wednesday – when it all started,” Sam pleads, beginning to lose the homicidal maniac face he’s sported for the past half-year and beginning to look like an earnest puppy again. “We won’t come after you, I swear.”

            “You swear,” Gabriel says slowly, but he’s just drawing out the inevitable at this point. He’s done all he can do; the rest is up to Sam now.

            “Yes,” Sam says, latching onto the opening.

            “I don’t know,” Gabriel says. “Even if I could -”

            “You can,” Sam interrupts, which is a nice little ego boost, at least.

            “True,” Gabriel admits, because he can do more than Sam could ever imagine, and this is the least of it. “But that don’t mean I should. Sam, there’s a lesson here that I’ve been trying to drill into that freakish Cro-Magnon skull of yours.”

            “Lesson? What lesson?” Sam asks, his brow furrowing, and Gabriel doesn’t think he’s ever gone back and forth between finding someone endearing and wanting to murder them so quickly before.

            “This obsession to save Dean?” Gabriel prompts, deciding to get to the point. “The way you two keep sacrificing yourselves for each other? Nothing good comes out of it. Just blood and pain. Dean’s your weakness. And the bad guys know it, too. It’s gonna be the death of you, Sam. Sometimes you just gotta let people go.”

            “He’s my brother,” Sam says, and yep. Back to the murdering.

            “Yup. And like it or not, this is what life’s gonna be like without him.”

            “Please,” Sam says, and the little bit of resolve that Gabriel has left shatters. “Just – please.”

            “I swear, it’s like talking to a brick wall,” Gabriel snaps, struggling to stay in character. “Okay, look. This all stopped being fun months ago. You’re Travis Bickle in a skirt, pal,” he’s just talking shit at this point, what does that even mean? “I’m over it.”

            “What does that mean?” Sam asks, cautiously optimistic.

            Gabriel smiles. “Meaning that’s for me to know, and you to find out,” he says, before giving a snap and finally, finally sending Sam back to where he should be, letting Dean out of his slumber and placing him safely back in his hotel room bed, six months ago.

            And if Gabriel sticks around to watch the absolute joy on Sam’s face when he sees Dean again? Well, he doesn’t like leaving a job unfinished, that’s all.

***

            Kali was the black goddess of destruction, the many-armed one, with her tectonic tongue and slavering jaws, moving mountains with her screams. She was the carrion goddess, rising like a crow above a thousand battlefields, a garland of human heads draped proudly around her neck, breasts bared, fierce and primal joy on her face. She was as hot and sensual as the land she reigned over, as far from the icy Norse as was possible.

            Is it any wonder, then, that Gabriel fell so deeply in love with her when he abandoned Heaven for good, the Crucifixion playing itself over and over in his mind whenever he was left to himself?

            She was mistrustful of other gods, his Kali, and he did not consider telling her of his true identity for a second, because she outright hated the Christian pantheon, feared their steadily gaining power, though she was far too proud to admit it.

            So with Kali, Gabriel was always Loki, in a far more complete and visceral sense than he was Loki with the Norse. Then, the identity had been playacting, little more than a glorified teenage rebellion, designed to force his father to pay attention to him.

            In the time after the Crucifixion, though, Gabriel ceased to even think of himself as Gabriel. He lost his purpose, his sense of righteousness, and he inhabited the mindset of a creature that was the antithesis of the archangel Gabriel, in every sense.

            Even the vessel he inhabited was tailored to his new identity. Gone was the beautiful blond vessel of the archangel, the outside beauty supposedly reflecting the inside. In its place was a small man with a clever, pointed face and golden eyes, the kind of man that humans had the habit of passing by without a second glance. Certainly, he retained the power to change his appearance to fit his needs, but he always found himself coming back to the original body, something about it feeling more like home than anything else he had.

            Kali was never as discreet as Loki. She was a different manner of creature entirely, of course, a goddess rather than an angel, and the physical form she chose showed it. Even when she was not leading the battle with blue skin and wild hair, four arms each expertly wielding a weapon, her form was incandescently beautiful, so much so that human men had difficulty looking at her.

            Loki used to ask her if she thought she’d ever try to fit in a little more, to be a little more discreet in her presentation.

            She’d laughed at him every time, eyes cruel and pitying, and told him that when you were as powerful as she was, you didn’t need subtlety.

            “You can’t understand it,” she’d say patronizingly. “I can do whatever I want, whenever I want, to whomever I want. I don’t need tricks or sneakiness.”

            Loki had always steered the conversation in a different direction after she said things like that, because he couldn’t entirely suppress the part of him that wanted to tell her that he could crush her with a single look.

            Loki never doubted that he felt far more for Kali than Kali felt for him. Kali had a pantheon, a family, an eternal lover in Shiva. Loki was merely a distraction, a toy, an amusement.

            Still, Loki was in no position to be choosy, and the centuries he spent with Kali – pulling pranks and receiving sacrifices, having sex in ways that were near impossible, trying his best to keep moving so as not to fall into the yawning pit of despair that his absence from Heaven caused him – rivaled his best times in Heaven.

            It ended, as most things did, because of the humans. Pagan gods needed their worshipers to give them power, and as humanity advanced, as the printing press and the railroad and the telegraph came into being, as India was conquered by the empire after empire, ending with the British, people stopped believing, stopped sacrificing, stopped giving their gods power.

            Kali grew brittle and bitter, harsh and angry. She wanted to rise up and rain fire and destruction on the unworthy but lacked the power to do so, and Loki, who occasionally forgot himself and displayed a much greater display of power than a defunct Norse god should have possessed, became the target of her fury.

            It was too much, reminded him of the beginning stages of Lucifer’s fall from Grace, and Loki, now bleeding back into Gabriel, did what he did best and ran, leaving Kali to create her monsoons and firestorms, and touching down in an entirely new place: America.

***

            The third time Gabriel runs into the Vessels, it’s not so much running into as it is he stalks them halfway across the country before finally getting the opportunity to confront them somewhere in rural Ohio.

            Things have been going to shit for months now, ever since the assholes that make up Gabriel’s estranged family had manipulated the Winchesters into raising Lucifer from Hell.

            At first, Gabriel thought it might not be so bad. Sure, he felt guilty as fuck every time he heard of another city falling victim to a Biblical plague, and sure, he spends a lot of time beating himself up for not doing more to stop this from happening, but no one knows where he is. He can hide, lay low until this shit goes to plan and hopefully Michael and Lucifer destroy each other, leaving the earth in the state in which they found it.

            Like anything concerning Sam and Dean Winchester, though, this Apocalypse is _not_ going to plan.

            He just wants them to say “yes,” already. It’ll suck for them, of course, and the casualties will be astronomical, but at least it’ll be _over_.

            The fact that they can’t see that makes Gabriel so damn _angry_ that he can’t think of anything better to do than trap them in a fake T.V. land for a bit while he contemplates the merits of just strangling them and getting it over with.

            He traps them in ‘Doctor Sexy, M.D.’ first, partly because it’s one of his favorite shows right now, just the right amount of cheese and sex and ridiculousness, and partly because he thinks it’s pretty damn hysterical that Sam hasn’t yet picked up on the fact that Dean is less than one hundred percent heterosexual, despite the fact that they literally spend all their time together.

            (Gabriel can’t dwell on Dean’s homo tendencies for too long, though, because that just reminds him of the _subject_ of many of Dean’s homo tendencies, which brings him right back around to murderous urges. If he’d known that Dean would one day have the hots for one of his favorite brothers, he might actually have killed him for real back in Broward County.)

            However, if there’s one thing that Gabriel has learned over the last few years, it’s that one should never leave a Winchester unattended, so he deliberately leaves out one of the major aspects of the character when he shapes himself into Dr. Sexy.

            “Really? Because I swore that part of what makes Dr. Sexy sexy is the fact that he wears cowboy boots. Not tennis shoes,” Dean growls, his hand at Gabriel’s throat. Gabriel doesn’t know whether to be more amused at Dean’s rampant crush on Dr. Sexy or at the fact that neither of these two seem to be able to go more than five minutes without slamming him bodily against something.

            Which, come to think of it, _also_ speaks to a lack of heterosexuality.

            “Yeah. You’re not a fan,” Sam mutters, always willing to take the piss out of Dean, even in the middle of a job.

            “It’s a guilty pleasure,” Dean shoots back, blushing slightly.

            “Call security,” Gabriel tries.

            “Yeah, go ahead, pal. See, we know who you are.”

            Oh, you have _no_ idea, Gabriel thinks, before stopping the flow of the doctor characters around them and melting back into his normal form.

            “You guys are getting better!” Gabriel says, because this is the first time they’ve taken less than a week to figure him out, even when he’s being really fucking obvious.

            “Get us the Hell out of here,” Dean growls, straight to the point as always.

            “Or what?” Gabriel asks, twisting out of Dean’s grip. He doesn’t see their trusty stake anywhere, so he doesn’t even have to pretend to be intimidated by them. “Don’t say you have wooden stakes, big guy.”

            “That was you on the police scanner, right? This is a trick,” Sam says, doing his signature thing of combining being pretty damn quick-witted with being slow as all fuck.

            “Hello? Trickster,” Gabriel says, gesturing to his face. Really, it’s right there in the name; of course it was a trick. “Come on! I heard you two yahoos were in town. How could I resist?”

            “Where the Hell are we?” Dean demands. You’d think he’d be good for something other than demanding answers and swearing, but Gabriel supposes he’s used to being able to intimidate the Hell out of guys his vessel’s size just by existing and doing his looming thing.

            “Like it?” Gabriel asks, neatly sidestepping both the question and Dean’s attempt to grab him again. “It’s all homemade. My own sets, my own actors…call it my own little idiot box.”

            “How do we get out?” Dean asks.

            “That, my friend, is the sixty four dollar question,” Gabriel says.

            “Whatever,” Sam says, interrupting the back and forth that Gabriel and Dean have going. “We just, we need to talk to you. We need your help.”

            And that…that is new. If you had asked Gabriel this morning, he would put money on the fact that Sam Winchester would be the last person in the world to ask him for anything, after Broward County.

            The kid just keeps on surprising him, and Gabriel hates himself for finding it impressive. It’s as a result of this that his voice is just a little bit harsher than necessary when he says, “Hm, let me guess: you two muttonheads broke the world, and you want me to sweep up your mess.” It’s unfair, because it’s not their fault, really. This has been set up since the dawn of time, and no matter how clever or reckless they are, the Winchesters could never stop it. Gabriel found that out the hard way when he last tried to get through to Sam.

            Sam, who is still not giving up. “Please. Just five minutes. Hear us out.” He does earnest well for a man that’s well over six feet tall, and it reminds Gabriel of the way Sam had behaved way back in townname, when he thought Gabriel was a lowly, sarcastic janitor and not a monster. It’s too much, this much hope in someone who’s lost everything, time and time again, just to get back up and keep swinging.

            “Sure,” Gabriel says, not really meaning it. He has no intention of helping, because he’s sure that the Winchesters’ idea of helping will be to kill Lucifer, and that is the one thing that he cannot do. “Tell you what. You survive the next twenty four hours, we’ll talk.”

            He’s been talking just to Sam, and is less than pleased when Dean butts back in. “Survive what?”

            “The game!” Gabriel says.

            “What game?”

            “You’re in it.”

            “How do we play?”

            “You’re playing it.”

            “What are the rules?” Dean’s been getting visibly more and more frustrated throughout the exchange, and so Gabriel feels justified in wiggling his eyebrows and then vanishing.

            He doesn’t go far, of course, just out of sight, but he doesn’t want anyone to see how much that conversation affected him. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea, because it seems that a conversation with the Winchesters always leads to him questioning everything.

            It’s when he’s sitting off to the side, pondering the differences between Broward County Sam and Wellington, Ohio Sam that he feels a familiar presence.

            “Fuck,” he swears to himself, because he forgot about Castiel. Time doesn’t move the same for him as it does for humans, or even for more ordinary angels, and he realizes with a jolt that he’s had them here for several days. Of course Castiel came to look for them.

            Gabriel could send Castiel halfway to oblivion, of course, but he’s a flexible kinda guy, and it might be a good thing for Castiel to be a part of this little plan. Besides, it’s been a long time since he’s seen his little brother.

            He’s grateful that his years of paganism have warped his power, changed the very feel of it, because if it hadn’t, Castiel would have been able to identify him from the moment he registered the power.

            He lets Castiel through, lets him get close enough to the Winchesters to almost spirit them away, then flicks him into a soft-core porno movie. It’ll be entertaining, at least.

***

            It takes another couple of days, human-time, before Castiel can find his way back to the Winchesters, which is a good thing, seeing as how Gabriel needs the time to reformulate his plan.

            He’s thrown Sam and Dean into several more shows in the meantime (he’s particularly fond of the Herpexia commercial), but they’re in the traditional sitcom one when Castiel finds them again.

            He bursts through the door, having somehow managed to get a large cut across his nose. Dean turns to him immediately, as though they’re connected or something equally as gross, and asks, “You okay?” His voice is sharp, but has a caring undertone.

            “I don’t have much time,” Castiel says, and Gabriel almost smiles, because he remembers Castiel’s habit of treating everything like it’s a matter of extreme gravitas. Granted, in this case, it actually kinda _is_ , but still.

            “What happened?” Sam asks.

            “I got out,” Castiel says, and that’s another habit that Gabriel remembers: a gift for understatement and a penchant for half-answers. Though the latter is something that most angels develop in their deals with humans, the first is uniquely Castiel.

            “From where?” Dean asks, and though he doesn’t show any outward signs of it, Gabriel can sense Castiel’s embarrassment.

            “Listen to me,” Castiel says, ignoring Dean’s question entirely. “Something is not right. This thing is much more powerful than it should be.”

            Nope. Nope nope nope nope nope. Gabriel was _not_ counting on Castiel being so sharp, was _not_ counting on Castiel knowing enough about the habits and powers of Trickster gods to see through him.

            “What thing – the Trickster?” Dean asks, as though Castiel can be talking about anything else.

            “If it _is_ a Trickster,” Castiel says, and Gabriel’s heard enough.

            He pushes a bit of power out, throwing it in Castiel’s general direction, and then he bursts out of the door.

            “Hello!” he yells obnoxiously to the fake audience, who dutifully cheer and whoop for him. Across the room, Castiel is getting up, a piece of duct tape firmly over his mouth, and looking at Gabriel with disbelief. Too late, Gabriel remembers that Castiel knows this form – he has been using it for a long time, after all.

            “Thank you. Thank you, ladies,” Gabriel says, before turning grandly to his brother. Castiel’s vessel has these big blue eyes, and those eyes are staring at him reproachfully. Gabriel can hear the accusation as clearly as if Castiel had spoken it aloud, the _why did you abandon us, why did you abandon me_?

            “Hi, Castiel,” Gabriel says, keeping his voice bright and cheery, and with a showy flick of the wrist, he banishes his brother halfway across the world, just to get rid of those eyes.

            “You know him?” Sam asks, barely even able to finish the sentence before Dean’s blurting out “Where did you just send him?” which just sums up their respective motivations here _perfectly_.

            “Relax, he’ll live… _maybe_ ,” Gabriel says, partly to get the canned laughter to play again (so having his life narrated like a sitcom may be one of his favorite things, what of it?) and partly because he’s annoyed with this whole situation.

            It seems like he’s not the only one, either. “All right, you know what? I am done with the monkey dance, okay? We get it,” Dean says.

            “Yeah? Get what, hotshot?” Gabriel replies, because he’s not even sure what he’s doing here anymore, really.

            “Playing our roles, right? That’s your game?” Dean asks.

            “That’s _half_ the game,” Gabriel replies, feeling like he’s finally getting to the point.

            “What’s the other half?” Sam asks.

            “Play your roles _out there_ ,” Gabriel says, gesturing to the world at large and preparing himself for a whole lotta pissed Winchester.

            He’s not wrong. “What’s that supposed to mean?” Dean asks, though from the tone of his voice, he’s got a pretty good idea.

            Gabriel just keeps digging, though, spells it right out for them. “Oh, you know.” He adopts his cheesiest announcer voice, which is pretty damn cheesy. “Sam, starring as Lucifer. Dean, starring as Michael. Your celebrity death match. Play. Your. Roles.”

            “You want us to say _yes_ to those sons of bitches?” Sam yelps, sounding, impossibly, _betrayed_ , like he expected better of Gabriel, after everything.

            “Hells yeah. Let’s light this candle!” Gabriel says.

            “We do that, the world will end,” Sam says, and he really should know better than to try and reason with Gabriel by now, especially by just making inane, obvious statements.

            “Yeah, and whose fault is that?” Gabriel asks, rounding on Sam. He feels desperate, out-of-sorts, panicked. He lashes out because he can’t _do_ anything else, doesn’t know what else to do. There is no good answer here, no neat little solution to all their problems, and the last time Gabriel felt so powerless was when Lucifer fell. He hates it, so he takes it out on Sam. “Who popped Lucifer out of the box? Hm?” He pauses long enough to get a good look at the guilt twisting Sam’s face, getting a sick sort of pleasure from it, before continuing. “Look, it’s started. You started it. It can’t be stopped. So let’s get it over with!”

            Gabriel doesn’t quite know how he expected them to react to this. Sam’s hurt glare is about right, but Dean says something then that brings him up short. “Heaven or Hell, which side you on?”

            “I’m not on either side,” Gabriel says calmly, because he’s about three seconds from snapping Dean’s neck.

            In typical Dean fashion, though, he just keeps going, keeps baiting the dangerous being giving him a million warning signals. “Yeah, right. You’re grabbing ankle for Michael or Lucifer. Which one is it?”  
            “You listen to me, you arrogant dick,” Gabriel says, no trace of mirth in his voice any more. “I don’t work for either of those S.O.B.s. Believe me.”

            “Oh, you’re somebody’s bitch,” Dean says, and Gabriel loses it.

            Before he’s made a conscious decision, he’s across the room, grabbing Dean by the collar and slamming him into the nearest wall. If he was less furious, less full of blind panic and pain, he might note that it’s nice to not be the one with his back to the wall for once, but he is, and so he doesn’t, and he’s being painfully honest when he says, “Don’t you ever, ever presume to know what I am.” He has to force himself to calm down a little bit before he continues speaking, because he’s _this close_ to just confessing, because he’s absolutely _dying_ for someone to understand. “Now listen very closely,” he says instead. “Here’s what’s gonna happen: you’re gonna suck it up, accept your responsibilities, and play the roles that destiny has chosen for you.”

            “And if we don’t?” Sam asks.

            Gabriel steps away from Dean and forces a smile on his face. “Then you’ll stay here in T.V. land. Forever. Three hundred channels and, uh, nothing’s on.”

            He snaps his fingers, and the world dissolves around them.

***

            Gabriel was knocked a bit off his game by the confrontation in the sitcom world, which is why the Winchesters finally manage to stick a damn stake through him again. He could just pull the thing right out of his chest, of course, but he doesn’t, lets them believe they’ve won for a little while before turning Sam into a car in a fit of pique.

            It takes a surprisingly short time for Dean to call him back after that, and so he’s suspicious when he appears, mask firmly back on.

            “Wow, Sam. Get a load of the rims on you!” he says, flashing the car a million dollar smile.

            “Eat me,” the Sam-car says flatly. If cars could be said to have an expression, Gabriel would categorize this car’s as long-suffering.

            “Okay, boys. Ready to come quietly?” Gabriel asks, looking around to see what they could possibly be hiding from him.

            “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Dean says. “Not so fast. Nobody’s going anywhere until Sam has opposable thumbs.”

            Humans and their conditions. “What’s the difference? Satan’s gonna ride his ass one way or another.”

            Dean stares Gabriel down, and Gabriel huffs and snaps his fingers. “Happy?” he asks as Sam climbs out of the car, looking uncomfortable.

            “Tell me one thing,” Dean says. “Why didn’t the stake kill you?”

            Oh, for Heaven’s sake. “Well, I _am_ the Trickster,” Gabriel says. He kinda can’t believe they haven’t figured it out yet.

            “Or maybe you’re not,” Dean says, and Gabriel immediately gets the sense that something’s wrong. Before he can move, before he can react, Sam pulls out a lighter and flicks it on, tossing it onto the ground at his feet.

            There’s a roaring noise as the holy oil circle he’s stepped into ignites, trapping Gabriel inside. Not for the first time in his very long existence, Gabriel curses his own pride. Of course they’ve figured it out, and of course they weren’t going to let him know. Much as he rags on their intelligence, the mere fact that the Winchesters are alive after twenty some years of hunting speaks to their ingenuity, particularly as they often find themselves hunting things that other hunters don’t even believe exist.

            “Maybe you’ve always been an angel,” Dean finishes. If circumstances were different, Gabriel thinks that he and Dean could really get along. They’re very similar, in their sense of humor and flare for the dramatic.

            Gabriel knows he’s in the midst of a heroic Blue Screen of Death, but he doesn’t appreciate the places his mind is going during this one; unbidden, an image springs to his mind: himself, helping the Winchesters out, spending time with Castiel, getting into prank wars with Dean, making Sam laugh, face open and unguarded…

            Gabriel forcibly pulls himself back to the present. “A what?” he gives a laugh that sounds nervous and insincere even to his own ears. “Somebody slip a Mickey in your power shake, kid?”

            He doesn’t know what he’s expecting to accomplish with his further denials. The Winchesters are too good at what they do to take what he says at face value and let him out of the circle, so he’s really just prolonging the inevitable at this point.

            “I’ll tell you what,” Dean says with a smirk. “You just jump out of the holy fire and we’ll call it our mistake.”

            Caught, then. Gabriel drops the act, along with the illusion. The three of them now stand in the nondescript warehouse that Gabriel had commandeered for his own purposes nearly a week ago. Raising his hands, Gabriel begins a sarcastic slow clap, mind working furiously as he calculates ways out of this situation. They won’t be able to kill him, not even with Castiel’s blade, but this warehouse isn’t exactly a nexus of activity, and if they choose to take off and leave him in the holy fire circle, it may be weeks or even months before someone stupider comes along and sets him free.

            “Well played, boys, well played,” he says. “Where’d you get the holy oil?” From Castiel, most probably, but he needs to buy time, needs to keep them talking.

            “Well, you might say we pulled it out of Sam’s ass,” Dean smirks, typically unhelpful.

            “Where’d I screw up?” Gabriel asks next. He can think of a million times where he’s been reckless, where he might’ve slipped, but he wants to hear it from the horse’s mouth, as it were.

            “You didn’t,” Sam says. “Nobody gets the jump on Cas like you did.”

            They haven’t met any archangels, then, clearly.

            “Mostly it was the way you talked about Armageddon,” Dean says, turning serious again.

            Gabriel frowns. “Meaning?”

            “Well, call it personal experience, but nobody gets that angry unless they’re talking about their own family.”

            That’s true, Gabriel supposes. He knows there’s a reason that Sam and Dean are the vessels, but the reason why has never been more obvious than it is right now. The twist of Dean’s mouth is bitter, and Gabriel finds himself wishing that he knew a little more about their background. He knows that their father got them into hunting, of course, but he’d really like to know exactly what kind of shitball you have to be to introduce your kids to that life.

            “So which one are you?” Sam asks. “Grumpy, Sneezy, or Douchey?”

            Gabriel wants to make some sort of quip about which of his brothers they must have met, but one, he doesn’t know which of his brothers they’ve met, and two, he’s tired of this. Tired of lying, of dodging the truth, of hiding.

            “Gabriel, okay?” he admits. “They call me Gabriel.”

            “Gabriel.” Sam says. His voice is flat, disbelieving. Gabriel can guess why; he’s sort of far from the Biblical version that they must know. “The _archangel_?”

            “Guilty,” Gabriel says flippantly.

            “Okay, Gabriel,” Dean says, and Gabriel instantly suspects that Dean knows far less about his story than Sam does. “How does an archangel become a Trickster?”

            “My own private Witness Protection,” Gabriel admits. “I skipped out of Heaven, had a face transplant, carved out my own little corner of the world. Till you two screwed it all up.” He doesn’t even try to keep the bitterness out of his voice.

            “What did Daddy say when you ran off and joined the pagans?” Dean asks.

            “Daddy doesn’t say anything about anything,” Gabriel says. There are a bunch of snarky comments he could make right now – he’s partial to “didn’t your boyfriend tell you that’,” no matter how juvenile “your boyfriend” jokes might be – but he’s still kind of in shock, still having a hard time processing this. Sam and Dean Winchester are the first beings in two thousand years to know his true name, so he thinks he’s entitled to a bit of a freak out.

            “Then what happened? Why’d you ditch?” Sam asks, sounding for all the world as though he actually cares.

            Gabriel opens his mouth to reply, but is cut off by Dean’s typically unhelpful response. “Do you blame him? I mean, his brothers are heavyweight douchenozzles.”

            “Shut your cakehole,” Gabriel orders. He’s not wrong, but Gabriel is the only one who’s allowed to say shit like that. “You don’t know anything about my family. I love my father, my brothers. Love them. But watching them turn on each other? Tear at each other’s throats? I couldn’t bear it! Okay? So I left. And now it’s happening all over again.”

            It’s not the full truth, of course – the full truth is so complicated that Gabriel’s not even sure if he can entirely make sense of it – but it’s close enough, and it apparently gives Sam an opening, because he goes on the attack, like a particularly tenacious bloodhound.

            “Then help us stop it!” he insists, projecting earnestness at Gabriel.

            “It can’t be stopped,” Gabriel says, his voice hollow.

            “You _want_ to see the end of the world?” Dean demands, aggressive.

            “I want it to be _over_!” Gabriel says, full-on yelling now. “I have to sit back and watch my own brothers kill each other thanks to you! Heaven, Hell, I don’t care who wins. I just want it to be over!”

            “It doesn’t have to be like that,” Sam insists. “There has to be some way to, to pull the plug.”

            Gabriel just wishes. “You do _not_ know my family. What you guys call the apocalypse, I used to call Sunday dinner. That’s why there’s no stopping this, because this isn’t about a war. It’s about two brothers who loved each other and betrayed each other. You’d think you’d be able to relate.” He feels flayed, like his insides are being exposed to the world, and he just wants Sam and Dean to feel a little bit of what he’s feeling, to punish them for causing this.

            Evidently, though, he has gone over their heads yet again. “What are you talking about?” Sam asks.

            Gabriel looks between the two of them incredulously. How can they _not_ understand this? The parallels aren’t exactly subtle. “You sorry sons of bitches,” he says. “Why do you think you two are the vessels? Think about it.” He gestures towards Dean. “Michael, the big brother loyal to an absent father,” looks to Sam. “and Lucifer, the little brother, rebellious of Daddy’s plan. You were born to this, boys. It’s your destiny! It was always you. As it is in Heaven, so it must be on earth. One brother has to kill the other.”

            Sam and Dean look horrified at his diatribe, and if he wasn’t still reeling from being exposed, he might feel bad for them.

            “What the Hell are you saying?” Dean asks.

            “Why do you think I’ve always taken such an interest in you?” Gabriel asks. “Because from the moment Dad flipped on the lights around here, we knew it was all gonna end with you. Always.”

            He doesn’t really expect them to believe him, or to take any advice from him, if he were capable of giving it. They’ve shown themselves to be stubborn enough in the past.

            Sure enough, after Sam and Dean take a long look at each other, Dean says, “No. That’s not gonna happen,” as though he can change it all just by saying so, or maybe by wishing really hard.

            “I’m sorry. But it is,” Gabriel says, his voice hollow. “Guys. I wish this were a T.V. show. Easy answers, endings wrapped in a bow…but this is real, and it’s gonna end bloody for all of us. That’s just how it’s gotta be.”

            There’s a long silence, then, both Winchester brothers looking stunned. Much as Gabriel would love to stick around here and deal with the inevitable manpain that will result from the mere idea that one of them could kill the other (ignoring, of course, how many times they have _already_ tried to kill each other, entirely of their own will), he would rather be just about anywhere else in the universe right about now.

            “So. Boys,” he says loudly, trying his best to cut through their fog with renewed obnoxiousness. “Now what? We stare at each other for the rest of eternity?”

            “Well, first of all, you’re gonna bring Cas back from wherever you stashed him,” Dean says.

            Castiel this, Castiel that. “Oh, am I?” Gabriel asks, just to be difficult.

            “Yeah,” Dean says, glowering. “Or we’re gonna dunk you in some holy oil and deep-fry ourselves an archangel.”

            Gabriel’s not sure how they would even manage that, but it sounds unpleasant, even if it wouldn’t actually kill him. He was planning on bringing his wayward little brother back anyway, though, so he snaps his fingers and Castiel appears in the room, looking like the literal definition of “ruffled feathers.”

            “Cas, you okay?” Dean asks, like Castiel is a fucking damsel in distress and not a warrior of Heaven, albeit one whose juice is running just a little bit low.

            “I’m fine,” Castiel says shortly. “Hello, Gabriel.”

            “Hey bro,” Gabriel says, wanting to forestall any reminiscing about their past or talking about their feelings that Castiel might want to get up to. “How’s the search for Daddy going? Let me guess: awful.”

            That does the trick: Castiel doesn’t really look upset anymore, just pissed.

            “Okay, we’re out of here,” Dean says, giving Gabriel a glare that could melt paint, presumably for pissing off his whatever. He starts to walk away, and Gabriel abruptly remembers that he is, in fact, still trapped in this circle.

            “Uh. Okay, guys?” he tries, but neither Sam nor Dean turn around. “So, so what? Huh?” he continues, getting angrier by the second. “You’re just gonna, gonna leave me here forever?” It’s no less than he deserves, really, but that fact doesn’t exactly make him feel any better.

            Dean only turns around when he’s reached the door of the warehouse. “No,” he says, still glaring Gabriel down. “We’re not, because we don’t screw with people the way you do. And for the record? This isn’t about some prize fight between your brothers or some destiny that can’t be stopped. This is about you being too afraid to stand up to your family.”

            There’s a fire alarm directly next to the door, and Dean pulls it, throwing a, “Don’t say I never did anything for you,” over his shoulder, before sweeping out of the room. Sam follows closely behind, the way he always seems to, but Castiel stops to give Gabriel one last look, his face inscrutable, before he follows them.

            The sprinklers on the roof of the warehouse turn on, and within a few short minutes, Gabriel is physically free, though he feels more emotionally trapped than he has in a long time.

***

            Gabriel’s only surprised that it takes Castiel as long as it does to show up.

            It’s about three weeks after the Wellington incident, and if you asked Gabriel, he would tell you that he had most assuredly _not_ been sulking.

            Really, he knew that he had been, but he figured he was entitled. What better time than the Apocalypse to feel sorry for yourself, right?

            Unbidden, Dean’s final words to him have been playing over and over again in his head. It’s not as if it was the first time that someone has called him a coward – Hell, he’s spent nearly half of the past two thousand years beating himself up for it – but something about this situation feels different.

            For the first time, Gabriel’s cowardice now _matters_. Sure, he thinks (hopes) that his leaving Heaven had made some sort of an impression on his brothers, but the sad truth of it is that all angels, even the Messenger of God, are replaceable. Heaven hadn’t _needed_ him.

            Now, though?

            Now, there are only a few angels that could possibly kill Lucifer and, as far as he can tell, no one else is gonna step up to the plate.

            He doesn’t even know if he could succeed, doesn’t know if he could outwit Lucifer, but he’s too afraid to even try – not because he’s afraid of death, or failure, but because he’s afraid of success.

            Anyway, he’s hanging around some nondescript little Midwest town, having just thrown a crooked cop to a pack of wolves (his choices of punishment tend to get less creative when he’s sulking). He’s lounging around on the roof of a supermarket when he hears the sound of wings and looks up to see Castiel sitting beside him.

            He snorts. “Took you long enough to peel yourself off of Dean-o.”

            Castiel chooses to ignore him, which is probably for the best. “Gabriel,” he says. “How are you?”

            “Completely and totally fine. Never been better,” he lies, forcing his face into a grin to prove it.

            Castiel doesn’t reply, just gives him a disbelieving look, and Gabriel folds like a house of cards. “Don’t look at me like that,” he mutters. “I’m…a little upset, alright?”

            “As are we all,” Castiel says pointedly. “For example, I depleted a great deal of my power trying to find you.”

            “You could have left well enough alone,” Gabriel says.

            “Could I?”

            “Probably not,” Gabriel admits. “I may have been outta angelic commission for a while, but one thing bled through: if Dean Winchester says jump, Castiel asks ‘how high.’”

            “That’s not -” Castiel begins, but Gabriel cuts him off.

            “Not true? _Please_ , little brother. You’re telling me that _you_ – faithful little Castiel – threw your lot in with the humans because it was the right thing to do?” he says the last four words in a mocking tone.

            “I would like to think so,” Castiel says, but he sounds unsure, and Gabriel pounces right on the weakness.

            “I bet you would. But you didn’t. You rebelled because Dean Winchester asked you to, you got cut off from Heaven because Dean Winchester asked you to, you came to see me because, even if he didn’t say anything, you know it would make things easier for Dean Winchester if I got rid of the world’s little Devil problem.” Gabriel heaves a sigh. “Would you die, if Dean Winchester asked you to?”

            “I already have,” Castiel says, the ghost of a smirk around his lips, and Gabriel sits straight upright, because that’s brand new information. “Wait, you _died_?” he asks, realizing too late that he’s just given Castiel an opening.

            “I did,” Castiel confirms. “It was the night that Lucifer was set free. It took Dean rather a long time to convince me to do the right thing – and I _do_ believe it was the right thing, even now – and we had to go see Chuck to find out where Sam was.”

            Gabriel quickly runs through his vast memory, but comes up empty. “Chuck?”

            “Charles Shurley,” Castiel clarifies, and that rings a bell.

            “They don’t name prophets like they used to, huh?” Gabriel says. He’s slowly relaxing back into the position he’d been in before Castiel had mentioned his death, lying on his back, head thrown back and looking up at the stars, weight supported by his elbows. “The prophet _Chuck_ ,” he snorts.

            Castiel looks amused. “In any case, Heaven knew that I had rebelled the moment it happened; I sent Dean ahead to try and stop Sam and stayed behind to deal with Chuck’s…protector.”

            Gabriel sits up again. “Raphael? Raphael killed you?”

            “He did,” Castiel confirms. “He has changed quite a bit in the years since you left Heaven. Most of us have.”

            “I thought we were supposed to resist change,” Gabriel mumbles, distracted. “So if Raphael killed you – and, since it’s Raph, I’m guessing he did so by exploding you instead of using a more civilized approach – then how are you alive?”

            “The same way that Sam and Dean found themselves on a plane over Bethesda, Maryland a few seconds after Lucifer rose,” Castiel says.

            Gabriel shoots him a look. “Straight answers, please. Small words, while you’re at it.”

            “God,” Castiel says.

            “You think God saved you,” Gabriel says flatly. “ _God_ , who none of us have seen in millennia. You think he came out of whatever self-imposed exile he’s in just to save the little seraph that could and his favorite humans?” he snorts. “I guess you changed by growing a sense of humor, Castiel.”

            “What other explanation could there be?” Castiel asks. “I may not know much about how divine power works, but I do know that not even one of the Seven has the ability to raise a fallen seraph. The only other explanation I can think of would be Lucifer, and how could he have a power beyond that of the Seven?”

            “He…couldn’t,” Gabriel admits. “How do you know that the Seven can’t raise angels?”

            “It’s partly common sense,” Castiel says. “Because if the Seven had that power, then why would they let any angel remain dead? But it’s also because Anna told me.”

            “Anna?”  
            “Annael,” Castiel says. “She…“went native,” as you might say. Albeit in a much more permanent fashion than you did. Anna was her human name, and I got used to calling her by it, I suppose.”

            There are a lot of questions that Gabriel wants to address there, but the most important is the past tense. “Was? You mean she’s an angel again, or…?”

            Castiel gives a bitter smile. “Both. She became an angel again, but I betrayed her, and allowed her to be taken back to Heaven for rehabilitation. She made an effort to prevent Sam Winchester from being born, and Michael stopped her. She’s dead, Gabriel, as is Uriel.”

            The news is like a punch straight to the gut. The Seven (and they still called themselves that, even after Uriel was demoted, for he would always be one of them in spirit) were his closest family, and now they are down to the Five.

            What’s worse, he wasn’t there. He didn’t know.

            He forces himself to speak. “What happened to Uriel?”

            “Annael happened to Uriel,” Castiel says shortly. “He was my partner, but you know how he’s never liked humans. He wanted to move against them, and when I would not join him, he attacked me. Annael saved my life.”

            Gabriel nods, numb. “And the rest?” he asks urgently. He has spent two thousand years avoiding every mention of his brothers, but now it seems imperative that he know everything.

            “Michael and Raphael are both alive, as you might have guessed,” Castiel says. “No one knows what happened to Azrael, of course. And Zadkiel has been removed from all this, though I am certain he is still alive. As for the lesser angels,” Castiel stops, heaves a sigh, and shakes his head. “Too many deaths to count.”

            “Fuck,” Gabriel says. It’s the only word he can think of that adequately sums up his feelings on this matter.

            “Indeed,” Castiel agrees, and the two of them spend the next few moments just staring at the stars, lost in their own thoughts.

            “So you think that I should work with the humans, then,” Gabriel says finally.

            “I do,” Castiel says. “Not just because I am friendly with Sam and Dean –” he valiantly ignores Gabriel’s snort and furiously wiggling eyebrows at the word “friendly,” “ – but because I believe it is the best way to end the cycle of violence in Heaven.”

            “You really think killing Lucifer’s going to stop it?” Gabriel asks, turning fully to Castiel for the first time since he appeared. “The Apocalypse, sure. That’ll be over. But I don’t think there will ever be a reality in which our brothers don’t fight each other,” he sighs and flops fully onto his back. “Face it, Cas, we come from the most dysfunctional family in history.”

            Castiel shrugs. “Maybe it won’t stop everything,” he allows. “And maybe it’ll be an uphill battle, but aren’t you tired of rehashing this same old fight?”

            “You know I am,” Gabriel says. “That’s why I left.” He sighs. “Look, I’ll think about it, alright?” That’s more than he gave Sam or Dean, and he knows that Castiel will understand what it is, an attempt at communication, an olive branch, if you will.

            “That is all I ask,” Castiel replies, and then he’s gone, leaving Gabriel alone on the rooftop with only his thoughts.

            It’s not until after Castiel has already left that Gabriel registers the fact that he’d used Dean’s irritating nickname for him.

***

            After the Seven, God creating a new angel ceased to be an event. Still, Gabriel remembers the births of some of his brothers, and one of them is Castiel.

            There were only a few angels that carried the same weight as Gabriel, the inexorable mark of the Chosen, the subset of angels that God had created for an express purpose. Though Gabriel was the first, and the most well-known, he ceased, after the Fall, to have the sort of slavish devotion to his vague cause that he’d had before.

            Still, that didn’t mean that he begrudged his brothers their sense of purpose, and when God created the newest angel, that ball of light and intent and goodness, and called it _Castiel_ , Gabriel rejoiced.

            God had called Gabriel, then, and told him that Castiel was like him, was Chosen, and gave Gabriel the additional task of looking out for him, of making sure that they both fulfill whatever purpose God has for them.

            This was before the Fall, but even if it hadn’t been, it wouldn’t have been a hardship for Gabriel.

            Castiel was inquisitive, bright, devoted, and Gabriel loved him fiercely. Though he still spent the majority of his time with the Seven, Castiel very quickly became Gabriel’s closest companion outside of the Seven. His more playful brothers would tease them for the way they seemed to be almost attached, but Gabriel always took them for the lighthearted, loving jokes that they were.

            In all the time that they were so close, Gabriel never once saw Castiel interact with Lucifer. When Gabriel would spend time Lucifer and Michael, his Castiel-shaped shadow would be conspicuously absent, having begged off with the excuse of garrison training.

            He asked Castiel about it once, and Castiel had given an excuse about feeling uncomfortable in the presence of one who was so beloved to God. At the time Gabriel had accepted the answer, hardly thinking that there could be any real reason for Castiel to be wary of Lucifer.

            And then humanity came and the Fall happened, and Castiel and Gabriel’s relationship was splintered for good. The worst part was that Gabriel barely even noticed it when it was happening, too caught up in his own angst about Lucifer and his new life among the Norse gods. He didn’t notice Castiel pulling away from him, becoming closer to Annael and Uriel. He didn’t notice that his other brothers no longer teased them for being close, even on the rare occasions that they did spend time together. He didn’t notice that Castiel stopped asking him questions, even though there were more things to question than ever with the advent of humanity.

            It wasn’t until the birth of Christ, that year that the humans called one, that Gabriel finally noticed the damage he had done by leaving his brother alone. When he returned to Heaven after the Annunciation, full of fire and vowing that he would never leave again, his first course of action was to find Castiel, who, though he congratulated Gabriel warmly, displayed a kind of awkwardness that had never before been present in their interactions. His speech had become stilted and formal, his observation of the rules of Heaven absolute. Though Gabriel had been saddened to see the distance between them, he’d had work to do, observing his charge’s actions on Earth and making sure God’s plan happened exactly as God wished. He’d thought that he’d have time to repair his relationship with Castiel, that one day the awkwardness would be lost and they’d be open with each other once more.

            Unfortunately, thirty years is a mere blip in angelic time, and before he could make any sort of headway in his relationship with Castiel, he’d found himself fleeing Heaven once more, with a vow to himself never to return.

            He didn’t think about Castiel much after that, not until that triumphant voice came through the connection that he hadn’t quite been able to sever, announcing that Dean Winchester, the Righteous Man, was saved.

***

            Elysian Fields will be the last time Gabriel sees Sam and Dean, the last time Gabriel will see anyone, in fact, though he can’t know that going in.

            Oh, he has an _idea_ , of course, but he cannot know for sure.

            What leads him to the hotel is simple: pagan gods aren’t exactly subtle, and he’s pretty sure that even someone who didn’t spend the better part of two thousand years among them would be able to tell that something big was going down when a big group of them from wildly different pantheons gathered together.

            When he shows up at the hotel, he’s masking himself, doing a Hell of a lot better job than the rest of them, because if there’s one thing he recognizes the necessity of, it’s the element of surprise.

            Kali is there, though she seems to be one of the few of her pantheon who is, and, surprise, surprise, she’s hanging out with fucking _Baldur_.

            Gabriel had always hated that guy.

            Anyway, Odin’s there too, which, _awkward_ , but at least he doesn’t see Thor. You sleep with a guy’s wife _one time_ , and he doesn’t forgive you for the rest of eternity.

            He watches for a little while longer, and then he hears the telltale roar of that fucking Impala, and things instantly go from bad to worse, as they are wont to do when they involve the Winchesters.

            The pagans hear the noise as well, and it seems as though it’s a signal for them, because they all immediately get up and part ways. Mercury runs to the front room of the motel, presumably to act as concierge, and Gabriel follows him, invisible, because he wants to see where this is going.

            Sam and Dean burst through the front door, soaked and panting, which, at least in the case of one of them, is rather relevant to Gabriel’s interests.

            Now is the time to think with his _upstairs_ brain, though, and so he merely watches, silent and invisible, as Sam and Dean attempt to figure out what the Hell’s going on here. He watches Mercury take blood samples from the both of them, and experiences a sense of foreboding; he’s all too familiar with what Kali can do with just a drop of a person’s blood. He doesn’t actually interrupt, though, until he learns of their plan.

            They’re going to try and _fight_ Michael and Lucifer!? Gabriel’s not surprised that it’s Kali who brings it up, bloodthirsty little thing that she is, but he can hardly believe that anyone can be that stupid. Has it really been so long since archangels walked the earth that all of these pagan gods have forgotten just how damn powerful they are?

            He has to do something, and apparently his version of ‘doing something’ involves bursting into the grand ballroom where all of the gods and Winchesters are gathered and then saying, in his loudest and most dramatic voice, “Can’t we all just get along?”

            Hey, there’s no rulebook for this situation; he’s kinda making it up as he goes.

            Predictably enough, fucking Dean nearly ruins his improvised plan before it even gets off the ground by attempting to say his actual name. Luckily, Gabriel’s quicker on the uptake than Dean is, and manages to avoid certain disaster by literally stealing the air out of Dean’s lungs.

            “Sam! Dean!” he says, continuing the drama while at the same time giving Sam and Dean his best warning glare. “It’s always wrong place, worst time with you muttonheads, huh?”

            Baldur steps forward. “Loki.” It takes a certain amount of skill to infuse that much disdain into only two syllables. Gabriel is reluctantly impressed.

            “Baldur.” Gabriel replies. “Good seeing you too. I guess my invitation got lost in the mail.” He arches a brow, knowing full well that there isn’t a single god or goddess in this room who would actually invite him to this kinda thing. His Loki persona was all about chaos, after all, and that’s the last thing you need when you’re actually trying to plan something.

            “Why are you here?” Baldur asks.

            “To talk about the elephant in the room,” Gabriel says, realizing far too late that Ganesh is in the room. He doesn’t blame Ganesh for trying to get up at that – he’s sensitive about ‘hung like a horse’ jokes, himself. “Not you,” he continues, and Ganesh sits back down, looking mutinous. “The Apocalypse. We can’t stop it, gang. But first things first. The adults need to have a little conversation. Check you later.” It’s not his most subtle segue, but he manages to get Sam and Dean safely out of the ballroom and into one of the hotel rooms anyway.

            “Okay, did that – Holy crap!” is what Dean opens with.

            “Yeah, tell me about it,” Sam says. He looks freaked too, but much less so than his brother. Mostly, Sam looks curious, and Gabriel resigns himself to the fact that he’s gonna have to explain some things before he leaves here. He really hopes that Sam’s not familiar with the old Norse myths. Those weren’t some of his finest moments. “By the way, next time I say ‘let’s keep driving?’ Uh…let’s keep driving.”

            Really, Dean should have learned by this point that Sammy is the brains of this operation, though Gabriel suspects that the Unholy Alliance of Assholes in the ballroom wouldn’t have let them get too far.

            “Okay, yeah. Next time,” Dean says, still looking pale.

            “Alright, so what’s our next move?” Sam asks.

            “I-I-I…I don’t know,” Dean admits. “Grab those poor saps out of the freezer, I guess? Bust ‘em out? Gank a few freaks along the way, if we’re lucky?”

            “And when are you _ever_ lucky?” Gabriel finally interjects. He feels it’s a valid point; there are very few people on the earth who are _less_ lucky than these two.

            “Well, you know what? Bite me, Gabriel,” Dean snaps. A-plus comeback, there.

            Gabriel’s isn’t much better, though. “Maybe later, big boy.”

            “I should’ve known,” Dean continues to gripe. “I mean, this had your stink all over it from the jump.”

            Gabriel resents that. “You think I’m behind this? Please. I’m the Costner to your Houston. I’m here to save your ass.”

            “You wanna pull us out of the fire?” Dean asks, and yeah, Gabriel supposes a little skepticism is warranted here, considering.

            “Bingo! Those guys are either gonna dust you or use you as bait. Either way, you’re über boned.”

            “Wow, cause a couple of months ago, _you_ were telling us that we need to play our roles,” Dean points out. “You’re über boning us!”

            Gabriel refrains from making the obvious joke. It’s a huge effort. “Oh, the end is still nigh,” he says airily, even though he’s not sure he wants that anymore. “Michael and Lucifer are gonna dance the lambada, but not tonight. Not here.”

            “And why do you care?” Dean asks.

            “I don’t care,” is Gabriel’s knee-jerk response, but it’s not true. “But, me and Kali we, uh, had a thing. Chick was all hands. What can I say? I’m sentimental.” That part is true, but it’s not the whole truth, and that fact makes him uncomfortable.

            “Do they have a chance? Against Satan?” Sam asks, and it’s really a bit of a role reversal, because Dean’s got this I-can’t-believe-you-just-said-that look on that Gabriel thinks would be more at home on his brother’s enormous puppy face.

            “Really, Sam?”

            “You got a better idea, Dean?”

            Dean might not, but Gabriel does. Leaving aside the fact that just about every idea is a better idea than that. “It’s a bad idea,” he says, because they all need to be on the same side here. “Lucifer’s gonna turn them into finger paint. So let’s get going while the going’s good, hm?”

            “Okay, great,” Dean says, ignoring his brother’s glare. “Why don’t you just zap us outta here, then?”

            “Would if I could,” Gabriel says, because it’s not like he hasn’t already thought of that. “But Kali’s got you by the short and curlies. It’s a blood spell. You boys are on a leash.”

            Instantly, both brothers’ hands go to the places on their bodies where they’d noticed mysterious cuts earlier. “What does that mean?” Dean asks, pawing aggressively at his own neck.

            “It means it’s time for a bit of the old black magic,” Gabriel says, conjuring up a container of breath spray just for the Hell of it.

“Okay, yeah,” Dean says, clearly less than interested about what Gabriel does with his dick, which is sort of a relief. “Well, we’re gonna take the hors d’oeuvres in the freezer with us.”

            Damn the Winchesters and their fucking hero complexes. “Forget it,” Gabriel says. “It’s gonna be hard enough sneaking you mooks outta here.” Like, escaping from Alcatraz hard. Without a boat, or even floaties.

            Dean gets this devious look on his face. “They called you Loki, right? Which means they don’t know who you are?”

            Gabriel does not like the sound of that. “Told you, I’m in witness protection,” he says cautiously.

            “Okay,” Dean says, “Well then how about you do what we say, or we tell the, uh, legion of doom about your secret identity. They don’t seem like a real pro-angel kind of crowd.”

            Gabriel resists the urge to do something extremely juvenile, like stick his tongue out at Dean or point out that his own joke about the group of pagan gods was funnier. “I’ll take your voices away,” he threatens.

            “We’ll write it down,” Dean counters.

            “I’ll cut off your hands,” Gabriel says through his teeth.

            “Well then, people are gonna be asking, ‘why are you guys running around with no hands?’”

            Gabriel doubts it – these bozos eat humans, after all, they’ll hardly be upset about a little bit of maiming – but this argument is not worth it. “Fine,” he says, hating that he’s giving in to Dean fucking Winchester.

            Not wanting to stick around any longer and listen to the inevitable argument about how Sam and Dean are actually going to release the people in the freezer, Gabriel takes a moment to center himself, locating the familiar flare of power that means Kali, and goes to her room.

            It’s almost as if she’s waiting for him, getting undressed in the far-too-nice room. Even after all this time, even after all the blood and pain, she still inspires a spark of the same reaction in him, just a little bit of the old magic.

            “Bonjour, mon amour,” he says, mostly just to be an asshole, as he conjures up a single red rose.

            “Leave,” Kali says coolly.

            “You always did play hard to get,” Gabriel says, going right for the jugular on the first try. Even if he doesn’t want to see her dead, he’s not about to be any nicer than he has to.

            “I’ve moved on,” Kali says, turning towards him and arching one sharp eyebrow. The form she’s in at the moment is one she’d never taken before, but it suits her – beautiful, with a touch of the Ice Queen that is her personality if not her power.

            “I noticed,” Gabriel says. “Baldur? Really?” Gabriel doesn’t like to be the kinda guy who thinks that everything is about him, but he distinctly remembers spending long hours making fun of Baldur with her, back in the day.

            “Baldur’s uncomplicated,” Kali replies, as though that could be seen as a good thing in any way. A pause, and then, “I never took you for the type.”

            “Romantic?” Gabriel quips.

            “Pathetic,” Kali answers, eyeing his rose with disdain.

            “You’re the one who called me here,” Gabriel points out, because he knows that she, at least, could hide herself if she wanted to. She hadn’t bothered, though, had caught his attention for the first time in years, and he couldn’t help but notice.

            “Because I thought you might take this seriously,” Kali says.

            That’s his first clue that she’s planning something big. At least, bigger than Kali’s _usually_ planning – she is kinda all about the revenge, after all. The Kali that Gabriel knew, the Kali that spent the better part of early human history jetting around the world with him in between overseeing bloody battles, would never suspect Gabriel would take _anything_ seriously.

            There aren’t many reasons that Gabriel can think of that Kali would want him here, even if she had been being sincere. After all, the Loki figure was known for his sneakiness and mischief, and Gabriel had been careful not to show his more righteous side in front of Kali.

            Hell, he’s pretty sure that for a couple of centuries, there, his righteous side disappeared entirely.

            No, Kali’s gotta know something she shouldn’t. She was always smarter than the rest of the pagans, more powerful, and she’s gotta know that she and the rest of her merry band of pagans won’t last five minutes against Lucifer.

            “I am taking this seriously,” Gabriel says. “Ship’s sinking, time to get off. I mean, screw this marble. Let’s go check out Pandora.” He watches Kali’s face carefully for a slip, but it remains stony.

            “It doesn’t have to be like that,” Kali says.

            “I’m afraid it does,” says Gabriel. Something does give away in her eyes, then, and Gabriel knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she knows he’s an archangel.

            He can’t retreat without giving himself away, though, and even though he could kill Kali easily, he doesn’t _want_ to, and she could cause him quite a bit of trouble.

            “If we fight –” Kali begins, and Gabriel wonders if she realizes that they’re having a double conversation.

            “You die,” Gabriel finishes, because even if he agreed to be on their side, he doesn’t think much of his own chances against Lucifer.

            “And what makes you such an expert?” Kali asks, giving him one last chance to confess.

            Gabriel doesn’t, because he’s a god damned coward, and he’s never gonna say it out loud if he’s not forced to. It just sounds so awful – ‘I was the mouthpiece of God, his connection to the earth, and I ran away and left my brothers in turmoil.’ “I’ve tussled with these winged assmonkeys once or twice,” is what he says instead. “Kali, no more tricks. I’m begging you, don’t do this.”

            “I have to,” Kali says, and that might be why he’s always loved her – she’s everything he’s not, in the most primordial way. She, he is quite certain, would never abandon her family out of fear. She might slaughter them in cold blood – he’s not entirely certain she hasn’t, though it’s kind of a relief that Ganesh is still alive – but she would never run away. She would go down fighting.

            “Can’t blame me for trying,” Gabriel says. “Still love me?” he spreads his arms wide and puts on his cheesiest grin.

            “No,” Kali says, blunt and truthful, and then she grabs his collar and pulls him in for a kiss.

            The goddess of chaos and war was never gonna be a shrinking violet, but Kali kisses like fire, like hurricane winds and landslides and heavy, heavy monsoons. She kisses like a tsunami, like something from the beginning of time, primal and wild.

            In the old days, a kiss like this would knock Gabriel, archangel or not, right off his feet. As it is, he’s far from unaffected – even if there weren’t still the last vestiges of romantic feeling there, he’s been too busy brooding to have any sort of sex in weeks – but he needs to keep his wits about him.

            He came here to get Sam and Dean’s blood back, to get both of their asses the Hell out of dodge, and that’s what he’s going to do.

            Gabriel gives as good as he gets, trying his best to distract Kali. He has a bad feeling about this, and even as his tongue twists its way into her mouth, he surreptitiously reaches behind himself, feeling around for the little vials of blood he’d seen on the table.

            Kali’s current form is taller than him, even if she weren’t wearing heels, and, not for the first time, Gabriel curses himself for choosing such a pint-sized vessel. The fact that he very nearly needs to stand on his tiptoes in order to kiss Kali properly is not only humiliating, but it also makes it kinda difficult to focus.

            Just when he thinks he’s in the clear, just when Kali gives a little purr in the back of her throat and adjusts her head for a better angle, causing Gabriel to catch a whiff of the sandalwood scent of her hair, he misjudges, causing his hand to clink against one of the little vials.

            It’s not much of a noise, but it’s enough, and, moving quickly, Kali pushes him away. The small flare of pain on his face, barely noticeable, tells him that he’s screwed, and not in the fun way.

            “Ow!” he says, mostly because he’s too shocked to say anything else.

            “You must take me for a fool,” Kali says smoothly looking, for all the world like she hadn’t just been making out with Gabriel like it was A.D. 109. It’s the next word she says, though, that rocks his world to the core. “…Gabriel. You’re bound to me. Now and forever.”

            There was a time when those words might have excited him, but now they make him want to run and hide, which he _can’t_ do, because she’s got him on a leash. Fuck.

            He should’ve known. He _did_ know, really, but he’d gotten cocky, thought he had her measure. It’s the same mistake he’d made the last time, thinking that Kali could ever be transparent, knowable. Her motives will always be a mystery to him, but, he thinks as he is forcibly pulled back into the grand ballroom alongside her, his name is hardly his only secret.

            He may not know her as well as he thought, but she doesn’t know him as well as she thinks, either.

            “How long have you known?” Gabriel asks as soon as they touch down. He vaguely registers that the room is full again, with all the gods and both Winchesters in attendance, but his attention is focused almost entirely on Kali. This marks two times he’s been found out in less than six months, and he needs an answer. He thinks back to Wellington, to _where’d I screw up?_ , and he thinks that the only answer he’s ever wanted answered more is _where is God?_

            “Long enough,” is all Kali says, though, and Gabriel resigns himself to never knowing.

            “How’s the rescue going?” Dean calls to him then. Typical Winchester bravado in the face of peril, or maybe he hasn’t realized just how bad things are yet.

            “Well surprise, surprise,” Kali says, addressing the room at large and ignoring Dean’s statement entirely. “The Trickster has tricked us.”

            It gets the rest of the gods’ attention, and Gabriel can see that Baldur and Odin, in particular, look intrigued.

            “Kali, don’t,” Gabriel says, even though it’s pointless, even though he knows that Kali does not change her mind once she’s made it up, not when the consequences are this important.

            “You’re mine now,” Kali says, coming close to where Gabriel is seated on a chair. “And you have something I want.” She reaches towards him, and for the first time tonight, Gabriel actually feels like he has the upper hand. What, does she think he just keeps his blade about his person?

            Quickly, he conjures up a new sword, a copy so well made that even some angels might be fooled, and Kali takes the bait, pulling it out and holding it up triumphantly for the other gods to see. “An archangel’s blade,” she says triumphantly. “From the archangel Gabriel.”

            Gabriel suddenly feels like what her victims must feel like, seconds before she descends upon them, ten hands and horrible gaping mouth. “Okay, okay!” he says, because that’s pretty damning evidence. “So I got wings, like Kotex. But that doesn’t make me any less right about Lucifer.”

            They should listen more closely to him now that they know what he is; after all, he is one of those who knew Lucifer. But the gods are afraid, backed into a corner, and they think they finally have a solution.

            “He’s lying. He’s a spy,” says Kali, and Gabriel can’t tell if she believes it herself or not.

            “I’m not a spy!” Gabriel protests. “I’m a runaway. I’m trying to _save_ you. I know my brother, Kali. He should scare the living crap out of you. You can’t beat him. I’ve skipped ahead, seen how this story ends –” he’s straight-up begging, now, and he’s not too proud to admit it, but if he can just get one of them to see reason…

            “ _Your_ story,” Kali cuts in. “Not ours. Westerners, I swear. The sheer arrogance. You think you’re the only ones on earth? You pillage and you butcher in your God’s name. But you’re not the only religion, and he’s not the only God. And now you think you can rip the planet apart? You’re wrong. There are billions of us. And we were here first. If anyone gets to end this world, it’s me.” Kali pauses at the end of her little speech, eyes impassioned and flashing. Gabriel dumbly thinks that she might have made a good avenging angel, in another life.

            “I’m sorry,” Kali says to Gabriel, then, only lowering her voice a little, before drawing the fake sword back and, in one smooth movement, shoving it through Gabriel’s throat.

            It’s a good strike, strong and true and without hesitation, and Gabriel takes time out of the lightshow he’s creating to appreciate that. He can’t stick around for long, though, and as he gets himself to the safety of the Impala, he spares one last look at Kali.

            He knew it was over, but this betrayal stings, just a bit.

***

            Luckily, Gabriel isn’t given much time to dwell on what had just happened, because less than five minutes after he ‘dies’ all of the humans that were trapped in the freezer come running pell-mell out of the hotel, followed closely by Dean.

            Gabriel seizes his chance. “ Psst! Dean!” he calls, enjoying the way Dean jerks and whirls around in surprise. “Don’t look at me! Act natural. Get in.”

            Dean slides into the Impala beside Gabriel, looking the exact opposite of natural. “Man, there is nothing natural about this at all,” he complains. “I thought you were dead.”

            Way to sound cut up about it, Gabriel thinks bitterly. “You think I’d give Kali my real sword?” is what he says out loud. “That thing can kill me!”

            “Then what do they have in there?” Dean asks.

            “A fake!” Gabriel announces proudly. “Made it out of a can of diet orange Slice. So, uh, so snag our blood, would you?”

            Dean looks as if this is the most ridiculous suggestion he’s ever heard, which is insulting, given that this man had once literally sold his soul to the Devil. “What?”

            Gabriel rolls his eyes. “I heard you in there. Kali likes you,” She’d always been a sucker for a pretty face, and, much as Gabriel hates to admit it, Dean definitely qualifies as such. “You can get close. Lift the plasma, then we can vamoose.” Once they get away from here, they can regroup, make a plan. The idea of leaving Kali alone to face Lucifer still makes his stomach drop, even after her betrayal, but he has no other choice – if she won’t listen, then he has no way to get her out of here without a whole lot of hassle.

            “No,” Dean says, face hardening. “Hand over the real blade. Better yet, why don’t you sack up and help us take down Lucifer?”

            If Gabriel were the type of being to be struck speechless, that would probably do it. As it is, he’s just annoyed. Hadn’t he explained, ad nauseum, why this wouldn’t work? He’s pretty sure he had, which means that Dean is just incredibly stubborn or incredibly stupid, neither of which are quite surprising.

            “You can’t be serious,” Gabriel says.

            “Deadly,” Dean replies.

            “Since when were you butt buddies with a bunch of monsters?” Gabriel asks. “That’s all they are to you, aren’t they?”

            “Alright, you know, Sam was right,” Dean says. Stop the presses, the brothers Winchester agree on something. Gabriel would applaud and shed a fake tear, if the thing they agreed on wasn’t a perfect way to get themselves, Gabriel, and a majority of the world’s pagan gods slaughtered. “It’s nuts, but it’s the best idea I’ve heard, so unless you have a better one?”

            Gabriel can think of a better one. He could probably think of ten better ones in his sleep, but he’s too busy mentally bemoaning the fact that he’s thrown his lot in with these assholes to think properly. “Well, good luck with that,” he says. “Me? I’m blowing Jonestown. Those lemmings wanna run off a cliff, that’s their business.”

            “I see right through you, you know that?” Dean says. “The smart-ass sHell, the whole ‘I couldn’t give a crap’ thing? Believe me, it takes one to know one.”

            “That so?” Gabriel asks, unwilling to admit that he can find more similarities between himself and Dean than Dean knows. Not as many similarities as he can find between himself and Sam – those are the similarities that go deep, unlike the surface-level ones between he and Dean – but he’ll never say that out loud. Hell, he can barely admit it to himself. Finding similarities between himself and the vessels? More similarities that seem to exist between them and their respective angels? He’s pretty sure it’s some sort of blasphemy.

            “Yes,” Dean continues, seemingly unable to cut Gabriel a break for thirty fucking seconds. “And maybe those freaks in there aren’t your blood, but they’re your family.”

            “They just stabbed me in the friggin’ heart!” Gabriel points out.

            “Maybe, but you still give a crap about ’em, don’t you?”

            He can’t hide behind a façade of humor and indifference anymore. Or rather, he could, but Dean would see through it in an instant, see right down to the heart of him, the fragile part that’s been shattered one time too many, the part of himself that he hides and protects, because the alternative is too fucking painful. “Dean,” he pleads weakly.

            “Now they’re gonna die in there, without you.”

            “I can’t kill my brother,” Gabriel says, and finally, finally, that’s the crux of it. Because Lucifer is an evil bastard, sure but Gabriel cannot kill him. When Lucifer was in the cage, lost to Gabriel, it was fine, more or less, though it still sucked. Gabriel gave himself permission to hate Lucifer for what he had done then, because, despite everything, Lucifer was still alive. Even if someone managed to pop Lucifer, Gabriel thinks he could handle it, thinks he could go in a little period of mourning and get over it. But killing him? Out of the question.

            “Can’t, or won’t?” Dean asks in the smug voice of someone who’s asking a question he already knows the answer to. Gabriel wants to rage against him, wants to ask what _he_ would say if someone asked him to kill Sam, but he knows that the situations aren’t comparable, so he keeps his goddamn mouth shut, for once.

            “That’s what I thought,” Dean says, reading the answer loud and clear on Gabriel’s face, and then he slides out of the backseat of the car and makes his way back towards the Elysian Fields.

            Gabriel just sits there for a moment, mind blank.

            Dean is right. Of course Dean is right. Lucifer’s going to burn the world, and Gabriel doesn’t want that to happen. More than that, Gabriel has a _duty_ to make sure that doesn’t happen, because he’s one of the Seven, goddamn it, and he knows, beyond all semblance of doubt, that this is not something that God would want.

            One thing hasn’t changed, though, and that’s Gabriel’s opinion of his chances against Lucifer. Gabriel’s out-of-practice, flabby – he’d never been much of a fighter even in his heyday, and he’s been relying on tricks and his opponents being significantly less powerful than him for the last two thousand years.

            But tricks are his forte, and as he sits there, an idea comes to his mind.

            It would be difficult, verging on impossible, a legend he’d heard that he can’t even confirm. Cages have to have a door, and what can be open can also be shut.

            The Horsemen, harbingers of the Apocalypse, riding in on their horses with their rings of power, the rings, that, if Gabriel’s sources are correct, can reopen Lucifer’s cage.

            In the back of Gabriel’s mind, he senses a power that he hasn’t felt for millennia. Since Lucifer rose, Gabriel’s been avoiding any place where he might be like the plague, but that doesn’t mean that he’s incapable of recognizing him when he does come.

            Lucifer’s presence is like lightning, and it jumpstarts Gabriel’s resolve like nothing else. Making up his mind, he vanishes from the Impala, going as far away as he can without triggering Kali’s spell. He’s got a plan to carry out.

***

            The scene that Gabriel finds when he pops back into the ballroom is nothing short of carnage. Baldur’s chest is gaping open from where Lucifer had, it looks like, ripped him apart with his bare hands; his eyes are wide open and staring, glassy, a look of shock and pain twisting up his handsome face. While the only body he can see is Baldur’s Gabriel can smell the blood and feel the power vacuum that means that the rest of the gods are also dead. Ganesh, Baron Samedi, Odin, Mercury, Zao Shen – all of them.

            Kali is still standing, the picture of vengeance, flames crawling up her vessel’s arms. Her back is to Gabriel, but he can imagine the look on her face as clearly as if she were facing him: a mixture of anguish and delight, triumph and defeat, hope and despair.

            Gabriel would thank God that she’s still alive, but he has an inkling that God had nothing to do with it, and that Lucifer knows exactly what he’s doing, who he’s dealing with. Hell, he probably pinned Gabriel the moment he arrived in town.

            Kali throws the flames at Lucifer, the cloud of fire so large and impressive looking that Dean and Sam, the only other living creatures in the room, duck down behind the overturned table, where Gabriel is also hiding.

            The inferno, despite its looks, does no damage at all to any part of Lucifer, and Lucifer steps forward, rotting meat-suit and all, to land a hard punch on Kali, sending her sprawling.

            “You okay?” Sam asks Dean, and Gabriel, theatrical to the end, replies, “Not really.”

            Both brothers whirl around to look at him, Sam hopeful and Dean suspicious, and Gabriel shrugs at their questioning looks. “Better late than never, huh?” he pushes the culmination of all his plans, the guide to saving the world when his attempt at killing Lucifer inevitably goes belly-up, into Dean’s hands. “Guard this with your life,” he orders, before throwing out a blast of his power, strong enough to knock Lucifer back from where he was looming over Kali just a second before, and certainly strong enough to alert any angel who hadn’t already been aware of his continued existence.

            Gabriel throws himself out from behind the table and draws his actual sword, taking a defensive position. “Lucy, I’m home!” he calls, and true to his prediction, he sees the utter lack of surprise on Lucifer’s face as he raises his vessel’s ruined face from where he’d landed. “Not this time,” Gabriel warns him, before bending down to offer Kali a hand, careful not to turn his back to Lucifer for even a fraction of a second.

            Yanking her up more roughly than is perhaps warranted, Gabriel calls out, “Guys! Get her out of here,” his tone of voice forestalling any argument.

            The Winchesters appear to know better than to get into the middle of an angel showdown, and so they obey him without question, the first time _that’s_ ever happened, ushering Kali out the door of the ballroom.

            Every atom in Gabriel’s body is straining to watch them as they leave, both to see that they get out alright, and, shamefully, to see the looks on their faces. This is the first time he’s stood up for anything in so, so long, and he feels so afraid and out of his comfort zone that he thinks that just a small look of approval, a little reassurance that he’s doing the right thing, would make a world of difference right now.

            He’s not sure if his eyes would go to Kali’s face first, or Sam’s (it definitely wouldn’t be Dean’s, he’s got his own angel to stare at him whenever he pleases, and Gabriel spares a moment to be intensely grateful that Castiel is not here).

            But he cannot afford that, because Lucifer is getting up, speaking, and Gabriel cannot allow his attention to wander if he is to have any chance of surviving this.

            “Over a girl,” is what Lucifer starts out with, his lower lip curling in disgust. “Gabriel, really? I mean, I knew you were slumming, but I hope you didn’t catch anything.”

            There are so many replies running through Gabriel’s head in that moment, _that’s exactly where you went wrong, you are incapable of love_ and _just stop this, please, we can fix this_ and _I’m not just doing it for Kali’s sake, I’m doing it for them all, all who you have killed and will kill, you monster_.

            What comes out is so stereotypically Gabriel, but it somehow manages to encompass all these replies at once. “Lucifer, you’re my brother, and I love you,” he says, very seriously. “But you are a great big bag of dicks.”

            Lucifer never did take kindly to being challenged, and his reply of, “Wait, _what_ did you just say to me?” as though he absolutely does not expect anyone to think he’s done anything wrong, is just as expected.

            “Look at yourself!” Gabriel shouts, then, gesturing to Lucifer, standing there in his moldering vessel, covered in the blood and guts of pagan gods, back up top for the first time in eons, not having learned a thing from his time in the cage. “Boo hoo! Daddy was mean to me, so I’m gonna smash up all his toys.”

            “Watch your tone,” Lucifer snarls, body tensing. His own blade is out, pointing sharp and true towards Gabriel’s heart.

            “Play the victim all you want,” Gabriel says, only half-paying attention to what he’s saying as he begins to construct a double of himself, the same trick that has fooled the Winchesters every time he’s met them. “But you and me? We know the truth. Dad loved you best.” It’s true, and ain’t that a bitch? God loving this lesser angel more than the ones who were supposedly his closest children, the Seven. Loving him so much that he was elevated, until his power was equal to theirs. Lucifer may never have been an archangel, but when you’re God’s favorite, you didn’t need to be. “More than Michael, more than me.” More than Annael, Uriel, Raphael, Azrael, and Zadkiel too. “Then he brought the new baby home, and you couldn’t handle it. So this is all one big temper tantrum. Time to grow up.”

            “Gabriel, if you’re doing this for Michael –” Lucifer begins, apparently not having listened to a single word out of Gabriel’s mouth.

            “Screw him,” Gabriel interrupts. “If he were standing here, I’d shiv his ass too.” It’s true, but it’s also the quickest way to pissing Lucifer off. Lucifer and Michael, Michael and Lucifer, inexorably intertwined throughout time, each other’s greatest love and hate, joy and pain, strength and weakness.

            “You disloyal –” Lucifer begins, angry, but Gabriel’s on a roll, now, his clone finished, and if he can just get Lucifer pissed enough to make a mistake, to slip up and give him an inch, he may just survive this yet.

            “Oh, I’m loyal,” Gabriel says. “To them!” he gestures toward the door of the ballroom with his sword. By his estimation, Sam, Dean, and Kali are out of danger by now, far enough away that Castiel’s marks on Sam and Dean’s ribs are hiding them from sight, while Kali must be masking her own power again.

            “Who? These so-called gods?” Lucifer asks, casting a derisive look at Baldur’s cooling body.

            “To people, Lucifer, people,” Gabriel says quietly.

            “So you’re willing to die for a pile of cockroaches,” Lucifer scoffs. “Why?”

            Because Dad was right. They are better than us,” Gabriel says, and he feels it down to his bones, has never been more sure than he is in this moment. If he survives this, he’ll make a point never to tell Sam and Dean that it was their influence that restored his faith in humanity.

            “They are broken. Flawed! Abortions,” Lucifer says, spitting mad now, and that’s when Gabriel surreptitiously switches places with his clone, teleporting himself to a few feet behind Lucifer. His sword is held in one hand, poised to strike, and he begins to move forward silently as he pitches his voice so that it’s coming out of the clone’s mouth.

            “Damn right they’re flawed,” Clone-Gabriel says, as Gabriel, taking advantage of Lucifer’s distraction, keeps moving forward. “But a lot of them try. To do better, to forgive. And you should see the Spearmint Rhino! I’ve been riding the pine a long time. But I’m in the game now, and I’m not on your side, or Michael’s. I’m on theirs.”

            “Brother, don’t make me do this,” Lucifer says, and he sounds so anguished, so broken, that Gabriel pauses for just a second, remembering the Lucifer that was, that used to be.

            As the Gabriel-Clone responds, though, says, “No one makes us do anything,” Gabriel starts moving again. He’s made up his mind, and he’s going to see this through. The Lucifer he knew is gone, replaced by this twisted, bitter excuse for an angel, and it will be better for everyone if Gabriel kills him.

            “I know you think you’re doing the right thing, Gabriel,” Lucifer says, just as Gabriel gets within striking distance. “But I know where your heart truly lies.”

            This is it, and Gabriel strikes, his aim true, the blade aimed directly for the center of Lucifer’s back, and for a split second, it’s in sight, life after Lucifer, after the Apocalypse, maybe going home and making up with the remainder of his brothers certainly seeing Castiel again, helping Sam and Dean…

            But Lucifer is one step ahead, as he always seems to be, and he grabs Gabriel’s arm before the sword can make contact, spinning around and thrusting his own blade deep into Gabriel’s stomach.

            Pain, the likes of which Gabriel has never felt, explodes through his body. He can see Lucifer’s lips moving, but could not hope to concentrate on his words, even if there wasn’t an odd buzzing noise filling his ears.

            Lucifer twists the blade, just a half-turn, pressing deeper, and Gabriel has no time for any more thoughts, no time to contemplate where he will go after death or hope that Sam and Dean will use his final gift and do what he could not.

            He is an archangel, one of the Seven, God’s messenger, but he dies just like any other being.

***

            Though days in Heaven were long and lazy, Gabriel was never bored. He didn’t quite have a concept of the feeling, each of his days packed full of exploring his father’s universe with his various brothers. He’d been with Michael and Lucifer earlier that day, but the two of them, as usual, had been wrapped up in each other, communicating in a way that was indecipherable to anyone else. Occasionally, Gabriel had to get away from them, had to remind himself that their closeness did not mean that they didn’t love him. At times like those, he inevitably went to his newest brother, Castiel.

            The two of them dropped down to Earth, making their way through the lush jungles and beautiful coastlines that their Father had created. Above them, Gabriel could sense Uriel putting his garrison through their maneuvers, various angels wheeling through the sky in intricate patterns, making sharp turns and sudden stops in accordance with Uriel’s orders.

            Around them, the various life forms of the Earth went about their business, completely ignorant of the two angels in their midst. Castiel watched as a large winged insect buzzed past him, on its way to attack a smaller insect. His eyes grew wide as the creatures made contact mid-air, the larger using its sharp jaws to kill the smaller in an instant. Holding onto its prize in a pair of its six legs, the insect whirled away on its iridescent wings, hiding away from the creatures that could kill it just as easily as it killed its prey.

            Though Castiel didn’t say anything about what he had just witnessed, Gabriel could tell that he was disturbed. “It’s a strange world down here, isn’t it?” Gabriel said.

            “I don’t understand these creatures,” Castiel said, leaning in close to examine some kind of enormous, fleshy flower, which was producing a truly awful smell. “Such short lives, and without any knowledge of God. What purpose do they serve?”

            “Not everything has to have a larger purpose, Castiel,” Gabriel said. “Father created these creatures because he wanted to create life. He asks for nothing in return.”

            Their walk had taken them out of the jungle and towards the seaside. Though Gabriel could not see them, he knew that the ocean harbored creatures terrifying in their size, with teeth like knives and horrible, glowing eyes. The surface of the ocean displayed no clues as to the turmoil in its depths, the waves washing on the shore in a calming pattern.

            Tiny crabs skittered away from their feet, claws raised threateningly. In small, clear pools of water, left behind by the tide, colorful starfish clung to the sides of rocks, and trapped schools of minnows swam around, the setting sun flashing off of their silvery sides.

            Ahead in the distance, there was a greyish lump on the beach. It was moving strangely, sluggish, as though it wasn’t meant to be on land at all.

            As they drew closer, Gabriel saw that it was a fish, small and nondescript looking. Its fins were not built for crawling across the hot sand, but the lack of gill slits on the side of its head implied that it was going exactly where it was meant to.

            Castiel was not paying attention to the fish, choosing instead to look to the sky, where a large, feathery creature was gliding on the wind currents, its mouth occasionally opening in an echoing screech. As a result, he came very close to stepping on the fish, and it was only Gabriel’s outstretched hand that stopped him from doing so.

            At Castiel’s questioning look, Gabriel gestured down at the fish, and they both spent a few moments watching it make its slow way towards the forest. The feathery creature seemed interested in the proceedings, but wisely chose not to come to close to the two angels, only making a few more lazy circles before changing the angle of its wings and flying out towards the horizon.

            Castiel was frowning in confusion at the fish, and Gabriel gave him a slight nudge. “Don’t step on that fish, Castiel. Big plans for that fish,” he said, and Castiel met his eyes.

            “What plans?” he asked, and Gabriel felt warm inside at the amount of trust and faith Castiel seemed to have in him.

            “I don’t know. Not yet,” Gabriel said, and the two of them stayed there, watching the fish, until the sun set.


	5. The Book of Uriel

[6]

Never in Rome,

so many martyrs fell;

 

not in Jerusalem,

never in Thebes,

 

so many stood and watched

chariot-wheels turning,

 

saw with their very eyes

the battle of the Titans,

 

saw Zeus’ thunderbolts in action

and how from giant hands,

 

the lightning shattered earth

and splintered sky, nor fled

 

to hide in caves,

but with unbroken will,

 

with unbowed head, watched

and though unaware, worshipped

 

and knew not that they worshipped

and that they were

 

that which they worshipped

had they known the fire

 

of strength, endurance, anger

in their hearts,

 

was part of that same fire

that in a candle on a candle-stick

 

or in a star

is known as one of the seven,

 

is named among the seven Angels,

[7]

To Uriel, no shrine, no temple

where the red-death fell,

 

 

no image by the city-gate,

no torch to shine across the water,

 

no new fane in the market-place:

the lane is empty but the levelled wall

 

is purple as with purple spread

upon an altar

 

this is the flowering of the rood,

this is the flowering of the reed,

 

where, Uriel, we pause to give

thanks that we rise again from death and live.

***

            When Michael assigns Uriel to accompany Castiel in guiding the Vessels, Uriel chafes.

            Uriel has been chafing for thousands of years, though, since his demotion, and this is just one more indignity in a long line of indignities.

            So he goes, touching down beside his brother in a second-rate motel room as they wait for Sam and Dean Winchester to appear to stop the summoning of Samhain.

            Of all his brothers that he could be second in command to, Castiel is not the worst choice. Oh, he is hardly the best – he’s just a seraph, albeit one who was lucky enough to be the first to reach the Righteous Man in Hell – but, after serving in the same garrison for so long, they have reached an understanding with each other, and Castiel is much better at treating him like an equal, at not looking at him with disgust or disdain or pity, than most other angels.

            Uriel misses Annael. Uriel misses Annael most of the time, but now, especially. She had been a good leader, kind, although unquestionably firm when it came to giving orders. It has been over twenty years, now, since she Fell, and, as he has countless times since she Fell, he wonders how it is she could have become so poisoned by humans, so _corrupted_ , as to Fall.

            How it is he did not notice until it was too late.

            Uriel is snapped out of his contemplations by an exceedingly large human bursting into the room and brandishing a gun, shouting, “Who are you?” at the two figures in his motel room.

            Uriel does not even bother to turn around. That will be Sam Winchester, the abomination unto the Lord, the boy with the demon blood, Lucifer’s true vessel. Uriel can see the dark stain on his soul without even looking.

            The other one, Dean Winchester, runs into the room, grabbing his brother’s arm and pushing it down. “Sam! Sam, wait! It’s Castiel. The angel.” Dean turns his gaze to Uriel. “Him, I don’t know.”

            “Hello, Sam,” Castiel says, the cadence of his voice indicating just how little experience he has speaking with humans.

            Sam stutters out a greeting to Castiel, suddenly looking less like a creature destined for evil than like an overexcited puppy. It’s sort of unnerving, actually, seeing Hellspawn so excited to see an angel. Uriel supposes he should appreciate while he can.

            There is a bit of awkwardness with handshakes, and then Castiel says, in response to Sam’s bumbling “I’ve heard a lot about you,” “And I, you. Sam Winchester. The boy with the demon blood.” From the window, Uriel suppresses a smile. “Glad to see you’ve ceased your extracurricular activities.”

            Still facing the window, Uriel manages to make his face blank again and then says, “Let’s keep it that way,” the first words he’s spoken since entering the room, if not the first words he’s ever spoken in the presence of Sam and Dean Winchester.

            “Yeah, okay, chuckles,” Dean says, hostile. “Who’s your friend?” He directs that query at Castiel, as though one short meeting means that Castiel is now on his side.

            Castiel ignores his question. “This, the raising of Samhain: have you stopped it?”

            “Why?” Dean asks. Uriel did not expect to like him – did not like him, in fact, at their first meeting, but he’s getting more and more irritated the longer he stands here. For someone who is allegedly supposed to be a savior, Dean Winchester is not very Godly.

            “Dean, have you located the witch?” Castiel says. Uriel feels he has been taught well – do not answer a human’s questions unless it serves your own purposes.

            “Yes, we’ve located the witch,” Dean says, mimicking Castiel’s stilted speech.

            “And is the witch dead?” Castiel says, as if he’s speaking to a three year old. The comparison seems apropos.

            “No, but -” Sam butts in, obviously not having gotten the memo that they are not interested in him.

            “We know who it is,” Dean finishes, as though that is worthy of praise.

            “Apparently, the witch knows who you are, too” Castiel says, walking over to the bedside table and picking up the hex bag he’d discovered. “This was inside the wall of your room. If we hadn’t found it, surely one or both of you would be dead. Do you know where the witch is now?”  
            “We’re working on it,” Dean says firmly, but Uriel can tell that he’s hedging.

            “That’s unfortunate,” Castiel says.

            “What do you care?” Dean asks. Uriel is very tired of this conversation. He was not expecting geniuses, but really, how moronic can you get?

            “The raising of Samhain is one of the sixty six seals,” Castiel says, and Uriel has to grudgingly admit that it’s a good thing he’s on this job, because Uriel would have either killed Dean or flown off in disgust by now, were he on his own.

            “So this is about your buddy Lucifer,” Dean says.  
            “Lucifer is no friend of ours,” Uriel says. He is so used to saying things like that, so used to being questioned in the aftermath of the Fall, that it comes out without any thought.

            “It’s just an expression,” Dean snaps back, and Uriel does not dignify him with a response.

            “Lucifer _cannot_ rise,” Castiel says. Though his voice sounds normal, Uriel can tell he’s getting a little desperate; after all, they are going quite a bit off-script, here. “The breaking of the seal must be prevented at all costs.”

            “Okay, great,” Dean says, voice falsely bright. “Well, now that you’re here, why don’t you tell us where she is, we’ll gank her, and everybody goes home.”

            “We are not omniscient,” Castiel says. “This witch is very powerful, she’s cloaked even to our methods.”

            “Okay, well we already know who she is, so if we work together -” Sam says.

            “Enough of this,” Uriel cuts him off with a hiss. He does not have time to bicker with humans, and he certainly does not have time to listen to Hellspawn requesting an alliance.

            “Okay, who are you and why should I care?” Dean demands, bristling from Uriel’s rudeness to his brother. Soon enough, Dean will have no brother left, so Uriel does not take it personally.

            He does turn away from the window, though, finally engaging fully in the conversation.

            “This is Uriel,” Castiel says, forestalling any hostility. “He’s what you might call…a specialist.”

            Unbidden, Castiel’s words bring images of Sodom and Gomorrah to Uriel’s head, the screaming, the smell of burning flesh, the flames licking the sky…

            Uriel shakes his head and walks forward to stand next to Castiel.

            “What kind of specialist?” Dean asks, sounding suspicious. “What are you gonna do?”

            “You -” Castiel cuts himself off and turns slightly to include Sam in the conversation. Since they’d touched down in the room, Castiel had been oriented towards Dean, in a way that’s quite unsettling. Uriel has to suppose that it’s leftover from when Castiel pulled him out of Hell. “Both of you – you need to leave this town immediately.”

            “Why?” Dean asks.

            “Because we’re about to destroy it,” Castiel replies, blunt and to the point.

            Sam and Dean both look shocked, as though that solution has never occurred to them. Maybe it hasn’t – Uriel does not know the thought processes of mud monkeys.

            “So this is your plan?” Dean asks, his voice hoarse. “You’re gonna smite the whole friggin’ town?”

            “We’re out of time,” Castiel says. “The witch has to die, the seal must be saved.”

            “There are a thousand people here!” Sam protests, as though he won’t be personally responsible for the deaths of thousands more. As if he hasn’t _already_ been responsible for deaths.

            “One thousand, two hundred fourteen,” Uriel says promptly.

            “And you’re willing to kill them all?” Sam asks.

            “This isn’t the first time I’ve…purified a city,” Uriel says delicately. ‘Purify’ isn’t the right word, of course, but he supposes it would not be entirely necessary to increase Sam and Dean’s horror, to tell them of the hundreds of thousands that died in Sodom and Gomorrah at Uriel’s hand.

            “Look, I understand this is regrettable,” Castiel says, still trying for diplomatic.

            “Regrettable?” Dean yelps.

            “We have to hold the line,” Castiel explains. “Too many seals have broken already.”

            “So you screw the pooch on some seals, and this town has to pay the price?” Dean asks.

            “It’s the lives of one thousand against the lives of _six billion_ ,” Castiel argues. “There’s a bigger picture here.”

            “Right,” Dean scoffs. “’Cause you’re bigger picture kind of guys.” His posture is starting to shift: where before, he’d been open, at least to Castiel, he is now closing off, orienting his body only towards Sam.

            Uriel can tell that Castiel is becoming frustrated with Dean’s seeming inability to understand logic. “Lucifer cannot rise,” he repeats, almost pleading now. “He does, and Hell rises with him. Is that something you’re willing to risk?”

            “We’ll stop this witch before she summons anyone,” Sam says. “Your seal won’t be broken and no one has to die.” So naïve.

            “We’re wasting time with these mud monkeys,” Uriel says, finally giving voice to the thoughts that have been swirling around his head since he’d been assigned this mission. He’s been around long enough to know that if you want something done right, you cannot entrust it to humans.

“I’m sorry, but we have our orders,” Castiel reminds Uriel. And yes, Uriel does remember the last time he disobeyed orders; he does not need Castiel to remind him, however obliquely.

            “No, you can’t do this!” Sam exclaims, stepping forward, as though he can change their minds with just the power of his earnestness. “You’re angels, I mean aren’t you supposed to – you’re supposed to show mercy.”

            Uriel loves that particular misconception. “Says who?”

            Sam looks shocked, unable to contend with the answer. “We have no choice,” Castiel says softly.

            “Of course you have a _choice_!” Dean says. He and his brother appear determined to willfully misunderstand the purpose of angels, no matter how much evidence they get to the contrary. “I mean, come on, what? You’ve never questioned a crap order, huh? What are you both, a couple of hammers?”

            Uriel supposes he is. He likes the description, though Castiel persists in looking distraught.

            “Look, even if you can’t understand it, have faith,” Castiel says. “The plan is just.”

            “How can you even say that?” Sam asks.

            “Because it comes from Heaven, that makes it just,” Castiel says. Uriel remembers a time when he had that sort of faith, when he was still that assured of his Father’s love.

            “Oh, it must be nice, to be so sure of yourself,” Dean says, and Uriel shudders at the fact that he’s just unintentionally agreed with Dean Winchester.

            “Tell me something, Dean,” Castiel says, stepping forward and staring at Dean just this side of too intensely. “When _your_ father gave you an order, didn’t you obey?”

            It’s a harsh blow, Uriel knows – he hasn’t paid that much attention to the vessels, and even he knows that their relationship with their father is fraught. Dean looks kind of betrayed, which is ridiculous. He’s met this being, what? One time? Two? He can hardly expect to be given special treatment after that. Humans are all arrogant, but Dean Winchester is particularly egregious.

            “Well, sorry boys,” Dean says. “Looks like the plans have changed.”

            “You think you can stop us?” Uriel asks, amused.

            Dean steps closer to Uriel, getting right up into his face. Uriel has to try very hard not to do something rash. “No,” Dean says, voice low and dangerous, as though there is anything at all he can do to hurt Uriel. “But if you’re gonna smite this whole town, then you’re gonna have to smite us with it, because we’re not leaving. See, you went to the trouble of busting me out of Hell. I figure I’m worth something to the man upstairs. So you wanna waste me, go ahead, see how he digs that.”

            Uriel hates, hates, _hates_ that he has a point, hates that despite his own disdain, Dean is actually smart enough not to fall for his bluff. “I will drag you out of here myself,” Uriel says anyway, because he feels like he has to do _something_.

            “Yeah, but you’ll have to kill me, then we’re back to the same problem,” Dean says, infuriating smirk stealing over his face. “I mean, come on, you’re gonna wipe out a whole town for one little witch. Sounds to me like you’re compensating for something.” He steps back from Uriel, then, and turns back to Castiel. “We can do this,” he says. “We will find that witch and we will stop the summoning.”

            “Castiel!” Uriel says sharply. “I will not let these people -”

            “Enough!” Castiel says, giving Uriel an order of his own for the first time since Uriel was placed in his command. Uriel is shocked enough that he falls silent, reluctantly impressed by Castiel’s mettle. Castiel looks to Dean and says “I suggest you move quickly,” an air of finality in his voice.

            Castiel turns back to Uriel, and Uriel takes the hint. The both of them disappear from the hotel room, leaving Sam and Dean alone.

            They pop up in a local park a few seconds later. Dejected, Uriel goes to sit on a park bench, while Castiel, seemingly oblivious to the odd looks it earns him, chooses to remain standing.

            They are silent for a few moments, and then Castiel says, softly, “The decision has been made.” His voice has a note of pleading to it, as though he’s apologizing for his harshness back at the motel room.

            Uriel laughs, a humorless sound. “By a mud monkey,” he says.

            “You shouldn’t call them that,” says Castiel, and wow, he’s further gone than Uriel had thought.

            “Ah, it’s what they are,” Uriel argues. “Savages, just plumbing on two legs.”

            “You’re close to blasphemy,” Castiel says primly. Uriel gives him a disbelieving look, which he ignores. “There’s a reason we were sent to save him. He has potential, he may succeed here.”

            Castiel finally seems to notice that it’s not exactly normal to hover next to the bench and sits down awkwardly. “At any rate, it’s out of our hands.”

            “It doesn’t have to be,” Uriel says. He knows, as much as he has ever known anything, that Dean will not stop the summoning, will not save the seal. Certainly, he may save some of the people in the town, but that is immaterial.

            “And what would you suggest?” Castiel asks, raising his eyes to Uriel. His eyes, or rather the eyes of his vessel, almost shockingly blue in his serious face, reflect Uriel’s own sense of helplessness, of frustration.

            “That we drag Dean Winchester out of here and then we blow this insignificant pinprick off the map,” Uriel responds promptly. They would kill two birds with one stone that way, or rather, one thousand two hundred fifteen people with one blow: by only dragging Dean out of the town, Sam would perish, and though Uriel does not have any doubt that he would be resurrected somehow, it would be worth it to have the annoying abomination out of his metaphorical hair for a while.

            “You know our true orders,” Castiel says severely. “Are you prepared to disobey?” The _again_ goes without saying.

***

            Exactly as Uriel had predicted, Sam and Dean do not save the seal, but they do manage to destroy Samhain. Castiel thinks it is not so bad, of course, but Uriel is much more focused on the method that they used to kill the demon than anything else. Leaving Castiel behind to think on the park bench, Uriel touches back down in the motel room the day after Halloween. As he’d hoped, Sam is the only one in the room, packing up the meager possessions that he and his brother tote around the country.

            “Tomorrow,” Uriel says, before Sam has noticed he is in the room. He enjoys Sam’s resulting jump, the way he whirls around with a frown to stare at Uriel. “November second. It’s an anniversary for you.”

            “What are you doing here?” Sam asks. His face is closed off, body language screaming that he does not want to talk about this. Uriel, of course, could not care less.

            “It’s the day Azazel killed your mother,” Uriel says, though he knows that Sam does not need the reminder. “And twenty two years later, your girlfriend too. It must be difficult to bear, yet you so brazenly use the power he gave to you. His profane blood pumping through your veins.”

            “Excuse me?” Sam says, still stalling for time, thinking that Uriel will drop the subject.

            “You were told not to use your abilities,” Uriel says, cutting straight to the point.

            “And what was I supposed to do?” Sam counters. He has a manic gleam in his eye, and Uriel is struck by the fact that this man actually thinks he is doing the right thing, actually thinks he is justified. It is amazing to Uriel that a person who grew up a hunter, never mind one raised by another as extreme and harsh as John Winchester, could grow up to be so cavalier about drinking demon blood. He hasn’t met the whore that is giving Sam his fix, but she must be good, to have worked this well on him. “That demon would have killed me, and my brother and everyone.”

            “You were told not to,” Uriel says again.

            “If Samhain had gotten loose in this town -” Sam says, still arguing.

            “You’ve been warned,” Uriel interrupts. “Twice, now.”

            “You know? My brother was right about you,” Sam says with a sneer. “You are dicks.”

            Uriel may not be able to kill him, but he will not take that kind of abuse. He steps forward, looming – although his vessel is considerably shorter than Sam, it is broader, and besides, he knows he gives off an aura of power. “The only reason you’re still alive, Sam Winchester,” he says, choosing his words carefully. “Is because you’ve been useful. But the moment that ceases to be true, the second you become more trouble than you’re worth, one word. One, and I will turn you to dust.” He stays where he is for a moment, eyes boring into Sam’s, and once he’s certain he’s made his point, he backs off, segueing smoothly into the next order of business. “As for your brother, tell him that maybe he should climb off that high horse of his. Ask Dean what he remembers from Hell.”

            After he drops that bomb, he leaves, fluttering off to the other side of the world. He doesn’t need to stay to know that his words have hit the mark.

***

Uriel had never had the highest opinions of the humans, but this specimen, Lot, was particularly unimpressive.

            Though ordinary in stature and looks, Lot had these beady little eyes that darted around the city as he led Uriel and Simiel through the city, never stopping long enough on anything to really take it in.

            The city of Sodom was ordinary in nearly everything: ordinary size, ordinary inhabitants, ordinary sin. The mission of Uriel and his henchman was simple: an inspection of the city, making sure that everything was proceeding as it should.

            They were not supposed to call attention to themselves, but Uriel had long been in the habit of small disobediences, shirking on the rules that he thought were silly, that he thought gave precedence to humans over angels. So instead of pretending to be an ordinary human, he was allowing his Grace to sit just a bit closer to the surface, allowing a little bit of his angelic nature to bleed through. This was clearly causing Simiel some distress – Uriel could see him frowning to himself as he followed a few steps behind Uriel and Lot, though a lesser angel like Simiel would never contradict one of the Seven.

            Uriel smiled to himself over Lot’s nervous chatter. It was good to be one of the Seven, good to have the type of authority that no one questioned. Blasphemous as it was, he thought that he knew what it felt like to be God in moments like this.

            Lot showed Uriel and Simiel to his modest home, opening the door and ushering them in with a sweep of his arm. Three women looked up at their entrance, quite obviously Lot’s wife and daughters, and he introduced them as such as soon as all three angels were inside.

            “We will be having guests,” Lot said to the women. “We are to show them hospitality.”

            The oldest woman, Lot’s wife, gave a demure nod and rose to her feet. “Are you hungry?” she asked, addressing the question to Uriel seemingly without even thinking about it. “It is quite a long way from the Plains of Mamre.”  
            “We do not require sustenance,” Uriel said stiffly.

            The woman gaped at him, understanding passing over her haggard face. “You are…” she gasped.

            “Edith,” Lot said sharply, and the woman fell silent. In the background, his two daughters, plain looking girls, bent their heads over the embroidery in their laps, too afraid to look up at the visitors and yet clearly sneaking glances from the corners of their eyes.

            Uriel smiled humorlessly. Humans. God’s worst idea, and despite what some of his more devout brothers may think, there had been plenty. His smile grew a bit more genuine as he thought of what Annael might say if she were here, of the reproachful tone that would be in her voice, and the musical giggles that she would be unable to repress at his audacity.

            Uriel had requested that Annael be his partner, when God had spoken inside his consciousness and urged him to come and begin his search for ten righteous men in the city of Sodom. It was rarely God’s way to entrust any mission to more than one of the Seven, though, and God had denied Uriel’s request. At that moment, Annael was most likely training her garrison, fierce and lovely as she executed perfect maneuvers, a beacon of light that all her underlings could look up to.

            Instead of being near her, being up in Heaven with beings he liked and respected, Uriel was stuck listening to Lot’s nervous chatter and watching Simiel’s awkward attempts to follow their orders and appear human.

            It was all very tedious, and Uriel wanted nothing more than to complete his mission and leave this place. Unfortunately, in his typical fashion, God had been cryptic and unhelpful in his description of what, exactly, the mission was. He knew he had to locate some righteous men, but he had no idea what the criteria for righteous men were. Men who followed the basic tenets of humanity, who did not steal or murder and who worshipped God above all else? Or perhaps men who went above and beyond God’s commands, who were leaders of their communities?

            Uriel had the sneaking suspicion that Lot, the man who God had specified was to be their guide, was supposed to be some sort of example as to what a righteous man was. If that was the case, then it was definitely not a question of finding remarkable people.

            Uriel was vaguely aware of the tension that had been building in the room around him, but he did not truly feel it. Still, when a sharp knock came at the door of Lot’s little house, he could feel the tension breaking.

            “If you’ll excuse me,” Lot said, unable to keep the relief out of his voice. He hurried towards the front door, and Simiel turned towards Lot’s wife and began to attempt conversation with her.

            It was hardly intelligent conversation, given that Simiel was a part of it, but Uriel could sense immediately that this woman, Edith, was much more interesting than her husband. He wondered if God’s mission included righteous women as well, but almost immediately dismissed the idea. He had discussed the plight of the human women with Annael many times, listening to her voice rise in pitch as she made her impassioned speeches.

            “They are treated as _property_ , Uriel,” she would exclaim. “And _nothing_ is done about it. They are bought, sold, not allowed to roam freely as men are. If all humans are God’s creation, then why does He allow half of them to be treated so poorly?”

            Uriel always looked forward to these conversations, because as much as he could not care less about whether or not human women were treated fairly, he loved it when Annael was as blasphemous as he was.

            From the doorway where Lot was conversing with his visitor, Uriel could hear gradually rising voices. Around him, the rest of the occupants of the house seemed to notice as well, Simiel and Edith’s conversation dropping off and the daughters abandoning their pretext of embroidery entirely.

            “Please leave,” Lot said to the visitor, his voice holding a note of desperation. Curiosity piqued, Uriel moved towards the door.

            The man that Lot was talking to was severely unkempt, his long, tangled hair and yellowing teeth making it impossible to pinpoint his age. He seemed to be having trouble standing up, swaying in place and occasionally listing dangerously far to one side or the other. As Uriel watched, the powerful smell of wine hit his nostrils, and he sniffed contemptuously. Drunkenness was a vice for which he had no respect.

            “Come on,” The visitor slurred, attempting to lean his head in towards Lot and almost overbalancing once again. “Why don’t you introduce me to your guests, Lot?” When he said the word “guests,” an unpleasant smile came over the drunken man’s face, twisting it into something hideous.

            “You’re drunk,” Lot said bluntly, and Uriel almost turned away from the conversation, bored, but the drunk spoke again, and Uriel was struck with anger the likes of which he had rarely felt in his entire existence.

            “Come on,” the drunk demanded, his voice getting louder with each word. Around the house, several of the people who were going about their own business stopped, fascinated by the spectacle. “Bring them out so that I may _know_ them.” An obscene gesture accompanied the word “know,” and several of the younger spectators began to laugh and jeer.

            Behind him, Uriel could hear one of the women give a shocked gasp, but he was too angry to care who it was. Uriel had been observing humans since their creation, and he knew all about that method by which they multiplied, that _sex_ that occupied so much of their tiny little brains. The very idea of a human sullying an angel in that way was unfathomable to Uriel, and he clenched his vessel’s hands into fists.

            Uriel couldn’t see Lot’s face, but he had enough experience with the man to be able to picture the look on his face as he desperately tried to find a way to diffuse the situation. The crowd outside was growing larger, many of the occupants of Sodom, young and old, male and female, gathering around. “I refuse,” Lot said, surprising Uriel a bit by the strength in his voice. “You may not mistreat my guests in this way.”

            “Who said anything about mistreating?” Someone in the crowd yelled, causing a fresh round of hoots and hollers to break out. The drunk, buoyed by this response, leered and said. “I’ll make ‘em enjoy it. I’ll make ‘em scream.”

            Lot looked around at the crowd, seemingly trying to find an ally among them. Though Uriel could see some faces that looked horrified, most of them seemed to be treating this as a wonderful joke, and even the ones that weren’t egging the drunk on were clearly amused. Uriel didn’t know if there was a backstory here, if Lot was not well liked or if people were jealous of his standing, or if they were just bored, but nothing about the situation amused him.

            “No,” Lot said again, making to step back inside and slam the door, but the drunk, with a strength that likely came entirely from his wine, stepped forward and prevented him from doing so. Uriel itched to smite the man, to make an example of him, but God had demanded subtlety, and even Uriel would not disobey a direct order in so spectacular a fashion.

            “Hey Lot!” someone from the crowd yelled. “If you won’t give up your guests, what about your daughters? I’m sure there’s someone out here who will make them into women!”

            The protesting noises of Lot’s daughters and the loud jeering of the crowd were drowned out by a strange buzzing in Uriel’s ears. He vaguely realized that his vessel’s fingernails were digging into his palms, drawing blood, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. He fixed his eyes on the back of Lot’s head, and waited for Lot’s inevitable protest.

            It didn’t come. For a long moment, Lot was silent, and then he turned around to look into the house. His eyes were large and sorrowful, but determined, as he looked into his house.

            “No,” one of the daughters whispered, her voice filled with fright, and Uriel snapped.

            “Enough!” he bellowed, infusing his voice with the power of his angelic voice. Behind him, Simiel squeaked, but Uriel was beyond caring, beyond thinking of the consequence. All he could see was Annael’s distressed face as she detailed the rape and murder of yet another female human, the raw pain in her eyes as she wondered why God could let such a thing happen.

            Uriel was past wondering why God let anything happen. The crowd had fallen silent, even the drunk cowering at the force of Uriel’s voice. In the sudden hush, Uriel turned to the shocked Lot, and said “Take your wife and children and get out of this town. Do not stop running, and do not look back.” His voice was completely calm, but must have had an edge of steel to it, because Lot merely nodded and beckoned to his family.

            The wife and daughters followed him, giving Uriel a wide berth as they made their way to the front door, eyes downcast. Maybe Uriel should have calmed down, after he had achieved silence, but it seemed that every occurrence was merely making him angrier.

            Outside, the crowd, still struck dumb, parted to allow Lot and his family through. The four of them, without food or supplies, headed towards the front gate of the town. Uriel almost ended it at that, almost went back to Heaven and left God to take care of his own unruly children.

            The old drunk, the catalyst for every event on that day, wouldn’t allow that. As Lot and his family gained distance, the drunk stood up and wobbled over towards Uriel. He opened his repulsive mouth, clearly about to speak, and Uriel, calmly and deliberately, set him on fire.

            The drunk let out a long, inhuman scream as his ratty clothes caught aflame. Panicked, he began to run, still stumbling, as his flesh began to char and shrivel. Uriel watched him with cold eyes, gaining satisfaction as each of his limbs caught fire. Usually, a human who was subjected to the flames would die of smoke inhalation, the chemical reaction of their own body burning choking their lungs, replacing the oxygen and causing them to suffocate.

            That was the easy way out, though, and it was a simple matter for Uriel to stop that from happening, to allow the drunk to feel every second of the searing pain, until the damage to his body was too great to allow him to live.

            Still making a horrible keening sound, the drunk fell to the ground, his flesh sizzling and letting out the rich smell of cooking as the flames licked over it. The thud as he landed seemed to break the stunned silence that had fallen over the rest of the crowd, and someone, a woman, added her scream to the drunk’s.

            Almost as one, the crowd began to move, people running full-tilt towards their own homes, clutching their loved ones. Some of them pressed their hands over their ears to try and block out the screams, and even more of them stopped to empty their stomachs onto the ground, the sour smell of their sick mixing in with the scent of burning flesh.

            Uriel felt no pity, no mercy. All he felt was power, as he turned back to Lot’s house and set it aflame as well. The small barn behind the house, made of wood and rushes, went up quickly, and the panicked mooing of Lot’s cows and clucking of his chickens added to the cacophony of the town.

            Uriel could see Simiel starting towards him, as though he’s going to stop him. With one smooth motion, Uriel pulled out his sword, manifesting it from his true form. “Don’t you dare,” he said calmly, and Simiel balked and disappeared, presumably going back to Heaven to report, as though God was not already aware of exactly what was happening.

            Uriel didn’t know if the fact that God has not intervened yet means he is giving tacit approval, but he also didn’t much care. Springing into action, he grabbed one of the nearest humans, a young male, and slit his throat with the blade he still held in his hand, dropping the body to the ground and moving onto his next victim with ruthless efficiency.

            Uriel doubted that all of the combat training God had insisted that he and his fellow angels have was meant to lead up to this, but it certainly came in handy as he plunged his blade deep into the belly of a middle-aged woman, slicing upwards and then pushing her on the ground, her organs spilling out of the fresh cut as she gave a rattling scream and then died.

            The humans were running in every direction, trying to avoid Uriel’s blade and the tongues of flame he continuously shot out, catching houses, crops, and people alike on fire. Some of the structures were made out of stone, and thus were a little more durable than the others, but they posed no difficulty to Uriel. Expending just a bit more power, he forced the plates of the Earth beneath him to give a sudden, cataclysmic shift, sending an earthquake rolling through the burning and bloody remains of Sodom.

            The shockwave knocked people and houses down alike, and through the middle of the town square, a yawning rift formed in the Earth. Those people and animals unlucky enough to be near it were sucked in, and they either died from hitting the rock on the way down, or else lived long enough to plunge into a seething lake of magma.

            In less than ten minutes, the town of Sodom has become completely unrecognizable. It was now mostly silent, the panicked screams replaced with the gurgles of the dying. Satisfied, Uriel took to the skies, working almost lazily now to finish leveling the town, targeting those buildings that were still standing, as well as those people who were still living. The winding river that ran next to the town was choked with bodies, and those parts where the water was still allowed to flow, it had turned a nasty color from the mixture of blood and ash that was infusing it. Uriel doubted whether it would ever be drinkable again.

            Although he had just singlehandedly caused the gruesome deaths of thousands of humans, Uriel was not yet satisfied. It was as though all of the resentment he’d always held towards the humans, multiplied tenfold after the Fall, was finally accomplishing something, and he did not want to stop, not until the entire Earth was purified, as Sodom had been.

            The next town over, visible from Sodom, was much smaller. If Sodom had been unremarkable, then Gomorrah was downright disappointing. As Uriel looked in the direction of Gomorrah, he could see a small trickle of humans evacuating. He supposed that it wasn’t exactly subtle, what he had just done to Sodom. Still, he was an archangel, one of the Seven, and the humans could not get away from him.

            As Uriel flew towards Gomorrah, he passed the one family that he had let go, Lot’s. Lot and the two daughters were struggling forward, gasping and choking and sobbing, the daughters holding parts of their clothing up over their faces to prevent the thick smoke still coming off the ruins of Sodom from getting into their lungs. Lot’s wife, though, was trailing behind, and as Uriel watched, she turned her head and looked back at Sodom. Uriel was disgusted that he had ever have a charitable thought towards her, and he threw raw power towards her before continuing on his way toward Gomorrah.

            If God didn’t stop him, he’d come back for Lot and the daughters later. He wasn’t unreasonable, after all; he’d repay them for their hospitality by allowing them to live that little bit longer. 

***

            The second that Uriel hears the whisper of _Annael_ , he springs into action.

            They’ve located her, finally, twenty-two long years after she Fell, after she tore out her Grace and left Uriel behind. The implication from on high is that she must be punished, that she must be made an example.

            Uriel is torn, more torn than he has felt in millennia, because he suddenly has a personal stake in this fight.

            _Annael_ , they whisper, one of the Seven, the peace of God, disGraced, disparaged.

            Uriel’s orders are to go and collect her Grace from where it had fallen, somewhere in rural Kentucky.

            When he touches down, he’s in the middle of a lovely field, full of life and vegetation. It’s the kind of place that would inspire a human painter to create a masterpiece, the kind of place for idyllic childhood memories, the kind of place where anything seems possible.

            Uriel barely notices any of it, too busy drawing closer to the large oak tree at the edge of the field. The closer he gets, the more he feels drawn to the tree, the more positive he is that he has found Annael’s Grace.

            Angels rely on the feel of things, the feel of other beings, much more so than humans do; it is a necessity when you do not, strictly speaking, have a body. The feelings of other angels, in particular, are strong, and Uriel’s knees nearly buckle as the feel of Annael washes over him.

            Annael is comfort, Annael is peace, Annael is love and light and joy and everything that is good in the world.

            Though his superiors had given him a spell, ancient Enochian words that will draw Annael’s Grace out from where it is embedded deep in the oak’s truck, Uriel feels as though he has no use of it, feels as though the Grace is everywhere, all around him, inside him.

            He finally steps up next to the tree and lays his hand on the trunk. It seems to hum in response to his touch, seems to come alive. Though the day had been hot and still before, a cool breeze whips up around Uriel, making the leaves of the oak rustle in greeting.

            Uriel closes his eyes. “Hello, Annael,” he says, surprising himself with the hoarseness of his voice. “It is good to see you again.”

            He steps back a little, then, and recites the words his superiors had told him, deep and guttural and ancient. If he’s expecting a fuss, a large, cataclysmic event, he’s mistaken, because the Grace exits the tree with barely a whisper, flowing into the small vial that Uriel is holding up for the purpose.

            When he has all of it, Uriel corks the vial and brings it up to his face to study it closely. Even with his angelic vision, it just looks like light to him, albeit light that is alive; it moves and pulses inside the vial, seeming to react to Uriel’s touch.

            He doesn’t think he’s been more conflicted since the times of Sodom and Gomorrah: before, even, because that was such a split-second decision. He knows what the punishment for Annael will be, when and if they find her, but he finds that he does not, cannot agree.

            Call him sentimental, but Annael is one of the only beings in this world that he gives a fuck about.

            Nevertheless, he is one mistake away from being struck down himself, and maybe it is a character flaw, but Uriel will always put his own well-being above any others.

            He goes back to Heaven, informs them he is in possession of Annael’s Grace, and tries not to hate himself too much.

***

            They try to reason with the Winchesters first, no matter how much Uriel may personally feel that what they are doing is not reasonable.

            They’re holed up in some little cabin in the middle of nowhere, Middle America, Sam and Dean and Annael and the demon bitch. When Uriel and Castiel walk through the door, Dean gives an exaggerated sigh, one of the many things he does that makes Uriel want to smite him, and says, “Please tell me you’re here to help. We’ve been having demon issues all day.”

            From where she’s lurking next to Sam, the bitch, Ruby, displays her blackened eyes. She cannot help it, it’s almost like a reflex, the pure evil inside her reacting to the righteousness that Uriel and Castiel display. Uriel does not need to see it in order to know who she is, of course: her face gives that away.  
            Uriel thinks that the face of a demon is one of the most interesting things in the world. It is ugly, certainly, so viscerally awful that it makes him want to recoil in disgust whenever he sees one, but, as he’s gleaned from his discussions from others, what each individual angel sees when they gaze upon a demon varies. The demon’s visage also varies depending on which demon it is, with the more powerful of the demons infinitely more ugly than the lesser.

            To Uriel, Ruby has a face like a beetle, hideous protruding fangs gnashing in air. Her lidless eyes look on Sam like she wants to eat him, to devour him, and Uriel wonders, not for the first time, how anyone could look upon this creature and trust her.

            He can vaguely see the face of her vessel behind the ugly, and he supposes she’s attractive enough; strong features and full lips, a mass of dark hair. It’s probably Sam’s libido, then.

            “Well, I can see that,” Uriel says, in response to Dean’s flippant comment. “You want to explain why you have that stain in the room?” Ruby’s hideous pinchers click at that, even while her human form cowers.

            “We’re here for Anna,” Castiel says, giving Uriel a reproachful look, as though he’s the one in the wrong here.

            _Anna_. The name for the human form of Annael. So similar, so _familiar_ , and yet so alien.

            “Here for her like…here for her?” Dean asks inanely.

            Uriel does not even try to parse out what he means by that. “Stop talking,” he orders. “Give her to us.”

            “Are you gonna help her?” Sam asks, somehow still hopeful, still naïve. Dean shoots him a look of disbelief, and Uriel sighs internally yet again. He is really finding himself identifying with Dean Winchester far too much; it’s unhealthy.

            “No, she has to die,” Castiel says, which is pretty much the exact opposite of what he should say. Castiel, who is almost as naïve as Sam, albeit in a different way, has not quite grasped the concept of lying yet. Uriel thinks that part of the reason he was assigned to this mission is that he has.

            “Why?” Sam asks.

            “Out of the way.” Uriel is not interested in explaining, even if this was something that could be easily explained.

            “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Dean steps in front of Uriel, waving his hands in the air. “Okay, I know she’s wiretapping your angel chats or whatever, but it’s no reason to gank her.”

            “Don’t worry, I’ll kill her gentle,” Uriel says, smiling humorlessly. He’s not even certain that he’s actually going to kill her, or even turn her in; right now there’s about a fifty percent chance he’ll let her go.

            “You’re some heartless sons of bitches, you know that?” Dean says. Ironic, that he says this about the one topic that Uriel does take to heart.

            “As a matter of fact we are. And?” Castiel says, stoic as ever, and Uriel is absolutely positive that, even with the years of serving in the same garrison, Castiel will turn Annael in without a second thought. As much as Uriel hates humans, there are some things that he thinks, in his most private moments, they have right.

            He supposes he has Annael to thank for that, Annael and her ridiculous love for the humans. He wonders how she feels about Sam and Dean Winchester. Probably thinks they’re wonderful – shining examples of humanity. That would be typical, Annael seeing the best in something or someone that Uriel disdains.

            She’d probably be able to convince him of her point of view, in time.

            “And?” Sam says incredulously. “Anna’s an innocent girl.”

            “She is far from innocent,” Castiel says.

            He’s right. Annael is an angel of the Lord, and even the most peaceful of the angels are soaked in blood. Annael led their garrison through the Crusades, through the bloodiest of wars, struck down humans, angels, and demons left and right. Uriel wonders whether the Winchesters would hand her over on a silver platter if they knew what she was. Probably not; they can justify their own body count, after all.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Sam asks.

            “It means she’s worse than this abomination you’ve been screwing,” Uriel says, even though the words leave a bad taste in his mouth. He is playing a role here, after all, and that is the official position of Heaven; traitors like Annael are worse than demons. “Now give us the girl.”

            “Sorry,” Dean quips, his position defensive. “Get yourself another one. Try JDate.”

            “Who’s gonna stop us?” Uriel asks, advancing on them. “You two? Or this demon whore?”

            With one smooth movement, he tosses Ruby across the room. It doesn’t really even take any effort: demons these days seem much weaker.

            He was expecting Sam to come after him when he went after the whore, but he wasn’t expecting Dean to attack him. He’d thought that was one of the things he and Dean have in common, a hatred of the whore, but he guesses that Dean’s alliance is still with his brother now.

            “Cas, stop, please,” Sam says, and if Uriel weren’t busy grappling with Dean, he’s be disgusted at the abomination using a nickname. As it is, though, he simply punches Dean hard enough to make him fly across the room, and watches as Castiel presses a finger to Sam’s forehead, knocking him out painlessly.

            Uriel steps forward once he sees that Sam is out of commission. “I’ve been waiting for this,” he says, mostly to himself. He still cannot kill Dean, a fact that will never cease to irk him, but he can still inflict quite a bit of pain.

            He never gets a chance to, though, because a rushing noise fills his ears and he suddenly finds himself back in Heaven, Castiel beside him.

            It looks like the higher ups did not know everything when they suggested Annael was out of commission. Uriel knows an angel banishing sigil when he feels it, and even if he hadn’t had sight of Sam, Dean, and Ruby before the banishing, there is no way that they could have known to draw the sigil.

            Annael’s memories are coming back, then, even without her Grace, and Uriel does not quite know what to make of that.

***

            It takes far longer than Uriel would like to locate the Winchesters and their various supernatural plus ones again. It appears that one of said supernatural creatures has taught them a way to shield themselves, because they are cloaked to the usual methods. Still, Uriel has a failsafe method for communicating with them.

            He chooses Dean, the brother that he can actually stand, at least some of the time, and he walks into his dreams, pushing through the nightmares of Hell and bad memories of his childhood to get to a space where they can speak freely.

            “Look at that. It’s so cute when monkeys wear clothes,” is Uriel’s opening line.

            “I’m dreaming, aren’t I,” Dean asks immediately, which is…worrying. His casual tone indicates that angels have been walking in his dreams before. The only angel that could have done that would be Castiel, and Castiel hadn’t said anything to Uriel about any dream walking.

            “It’s the only way we could chat,” Uriel says, choosing not to go down that road. “Since you’re hiding like cowards.”

            “Don’t normally see you off leash,” Dean says with a smirk. “Where’s your boss?”

            “Castiel?” Uriel replies. “He’s not here. See, he has this weakness. He likes you.” The higher ups hadn’t specifically told Uriel that this was why he was to be the one to do the dream walking mission, but Uriel can read between the lines; if he’s noticed Castiel’s weakness, then surely Michael and Zachariah have as well. “Time’s up, boy. We want the girl.”

            “Wouldn’t try that if I were you,” Dean says, turning up the bravado. “See, she got her Grace back. Full-blown angel, now.”

            So they’ve somehow discovered Annael’s past. “That would be a neat trick,” Uriel says. “Considering I have her Grace right here.” He pulls out the little vial, which he’s attached to a string around his neck. “We can’t let Hell get their hooks into her.”

            Dean deflates a little. “Well, then why don’t you just give her back her angel juice?”

            “She committed a serious crime,” Uriel says, even while he’s considering doing just that.

            “What? Thinking for herself?” Dean demands.

            “This is our business, not yours,” Uriel says. “She’s not even human…not technically.”

            “Yeah, well, I guess I just like being a pain in the pooper,” Dean says, which is pretty much the understatement of the century.

            Uriel squints at him curiously, his stomach sinking. Dean had not seemed this…adamant about Annael’s protection the last time he’d seen him. Something has changed, and he has the feeling that he knows what. “No. There’s more,” he says, and if he thought he hated Dean Winchester before, it is nothing to how he feels now. “You cut yourself a slice of…angel food cake. Didn’t you? Huh? You did.”

            Now that Uriel has noticed it, it’s the most obvious thing in the world. Dean reeks of sex, of Annael, and Uriel can feel himself getting angrier and angrier by the moment at the thought of Annael defiling herself with this human.

            “What do you care?” Dean asks, immediately going on the defensive. It’s as good as a confession. “You’re junkless down there, right? Like a Ken doll?”

            It’s partially true, in that angels are not designed to have sex. It does not bother Uriel as much as Dean seems to think it will, though, because sex is something he does not understand, cannot imagine having. It’s so low, so dirty, so _human_.

            “Well, it’s your last chance,” Uriel says carelessly. “Give us the girl, or -”

            “Or what?” Dean scoffs. “What, you’re gonna toss me back in the hole? You’re bluffing.”

            “Try me,” Uriel says. “This is a whole lot bigger than the plans we got for you, Dean. You can be replaced.”

            “What the Hell? Go ahead and do it,” Dean says, and though Uriel can see the hint of fear in his eyes, can see the way that the four months in Hell is affecting him even now, the way the Hellfire is always in the back of his mind, he stands stalwart. He’s brave, Uriel has to admit. Foolish, but brave.

            “You’re just crazy enough to go, aren’t you?” Uriel asks rhetorically. Of course he is; he’s done it once already, and Uriel’s only mistake is assuming that Sam is the only one he would do it for. Uriel guesses that when you carry around ten pounds of self-loathing in a five pound bag, throwing yourself on the grenade over and over again must feel good, in a sick sort of way.

            “What can I say?” Dean says, shrugging, with a devil-may-care smile on his face. “I don’t break easy.”

            Uriel has to laugh. “Oh yes, you do. You just got to know where to apply the right pressure. If you do not tell us where you are, how to find Anna, we will go after Sam. And sure, you might be able to hide from us for a while, but you cannot hide forever. We will find him, and we will kill him.”

            The smile disappears from Dean’s face for the first time in the conversation, the false bravado dissolving easily. Uriel knows he has him, then, even before Dean grinds his teeth together and then grits out, “Sioux Falls, North Dakota.”

            Uriel nods. “Bobby Singer. We should have known.”

            “You leave him alone,” Dean says sharply. “He has nothing to do with this.”

            Uriel waves a dismissive hand. “We do not care about that old drunk,” he says. “We will be by for Anna tomorrow morning. Be waiting.”

He disappears, then, in a rustle of wings. He’s been here long enough

***

            When he goes to Sioux Falls, Castiel is with him again, and though he is usually taciturn, the level of silence he’s displaying is uncharacteristic. Uriel has been through Heaven’s idea of re-education once before, and though he knows that Castiel likely hasn’t gotten the full effect – he hasn’t actually _done_ anything to rebel yet, after all – he still doesn’t envy him the experience.

            Just as they had a few days before, in a different barn halfway across the country, Castiel and Uriel make the doors open with a blast. Both Sam and Dean are in the room, as expected, but the demon is no longer with them, and Uriel spares a moment to wonder why – she’s been like Sam’s particularly evil shadow this entire time, it doesn’t make sense that she would be gone now.

            And then he lays eyes on Annael, and all extraneous concern flies out of his head.

            Her human body is physically pleasing enough, he supposes – young, pretty, with masses of dyed red hair and a trim body hiding beneath her clothes – but it is her eyes that get him, because although she does not feel the same, with her entire being in the vial around Uriel’s neck, those eyes speak of years she should not have.

            They speak of experience, of knowledge and power and leading a garrison in the battle, of idyllic days in Heaven juxtaposed with horrible tragedies.

            For the first time in his existence, Uriel considers that it may not be Grace that makes up the entirety of an angel’s being. He expected to find no trace of Annael in the girl calling herself Anna Milton, but he was mistaken.

            “Hello, Anna. It’s good to see you,” Castiel says, the old courtesy of a seraph to his commander returning. Uriel wonders if Castiel can see the same things as him in Annael’s eyes, or if that is only due to his own relationship with Annael, his own knowledge of her.

            “How? How did you find us?” Sam asks wildly, looking panicked. He pauses, bites his lip, and then says “Dean?” in a way that suggests he wants nothing more than for Dean to tell him a lie.

            Instead, Dean turns to Annael. “I’m sorry,” he says, looking at her with cow eyes, and Uriel feels his facial features rearrange into a glare without his consent.

            “Why?” Sam asks, turning his own puppy dog eyes on his brother.

            It is Annael who answers the question, though, still looking at Dean. “Because they gave him a choice,” she says, nothing but understanding in her voice. “They either kill me, or they kill you. I know how their minds work.”

            She steps forward, then, uncaring of the gazes on her, and kisses Dean, their lips pressing together for a moment. It’s not overly sexual, clearly just a goodbye, but Uriel finds himself unable to look at them, and he turns away, only to see Castiel staring at the pair of them with a look on his face that Uriel can relate to.

            It’s clear, though, that their anguish is not directed at the same person. Uriel’s eyes are drawn back to Annael and Dean, and he sees Annael’s eyes open, staring directly at Castiel. There’s a challenge there, a warning, and if even Annael knows where Castiel’s heart lies, he is in quite a bit of danger.

            Annael pulls back. “You did the best you could,” she says, keeping one hand on the back of Dean’s neck and holding his gaze. “I forgive you.”

            She turns away from him, then, and faces forward, rolling her shoulders back. For a person in such a small body, she is a commanding presence. “Okay, no more tricks,” she says. “No more running. I’m ready.”

            “I’m sorry,” Castiel says, but he is surely not as sorry as Uriel is. Uriel finds himself, almost unconsciously, beginning to run through situations in his mind, ways he might help her escape, because as much as she’s betrayed him, as much as he hates everything she now stands for, he does not want her to die.

            He’s not entirely sure he wants her to go back to the way she was before, either.

            “No, you’re not,” Annael says, voice steely. “Not really. You don’t know the feeling.”

            That’s unfair, Uriel thinks, but he knows that Annael is far from perfect, knows that she has had to exaggerate the struggles of being an angel in order to justify her choice. Angels can feel regret and happiness and all other emotions – Uriel himself should be proof of that, standing here in this little barn, with more feelings coursing through him than he thought were possible.

            “Still, we have a history,” Castiel says, as though he’s seeking forgiveness. As though his apologies will make any of this better. “It’s just -”

            “Orders are orders, I know,” Annael says. “Just make it quick.”

            She steps forward, but before either Uriel or Castiel can react, there are suddenly four more people in the room.

            One of them is the demon bitch, Ruby, though she looks a lot less cocky than she had the last time Uriel had seen her. She’s bleeding profusely from the stomach, and it seems as though that has rendered her incapable of standing, because she’s hanging weakly from the arms of two other demons.

            There’s another demon, standing out in front of the rest, like a leader. At the sight of that demon, Uriel feels his stomach lurch, an instant, visceral hatred taking him over. It’s not just the demon’s appearance – though both his human face and his demon face are loathsome, one that of a skinny, sickly looking old man with a sneer twisting his lips and the other eight-eyed, like a spider, but with the cruel beak of a bird of prey.

            No, the reason Uriel reacts in this way is because he knows this demon – Alastair.

            The third and fourth demons, two of the interchangeable lackey type, don’t even merit Uriel’s notice.

            “Don’t you dare touch a hair on that poor girl’s head,” Alastair says, and even his voice is awful – whining, lisping.

            Uriel steps forward as the two lackey demons throw Ruby off to the side like a sack of flour. “How dare you come in this room,” he says, voice low and angry, “you pussing sore?”       

            Alastair steps up to meet him, and the two of them face off in the middle of the room, like a mockery of a scene from an old Western. “Name calling,” Alastair says. “That hurt my feelings. You sanctimonious, fanatical prick.”

            “Turn around and walk away now,” Castiel says, much more diplomatic than Uriel feels the need to be.

            “Sure,” Alastair says easily. “Just give us the girl. We’ll make sure she gets punished good and proper.” He gives a wink at the end of the sentence, and Uriel is furious, will not fathom the thought of handing Annael over to Alastair. He’s not thinking of orders now, though surely their superiors would not want it either; he’s going purely on instinct.

            Despite his anger, he forces himself to hang back. Though he is much more powerful than these demons, they do have the advantage of numbers, and it is only by being on the same page that he and Castiel will be able to destroy them.

            “You know who we are and what we will do,” Castiel says. “I won’t say it again. Leave now, or we lay you to waste.” Even as he speaks, he’s subtly shifting into battle posture, knowing that his words won’t have any effect. This is another reason that Uriel is grateful it is Castiel he is paired with, despite his apparent affinity for mouthy humans – he may be young, but he is scrappy, good in a fight.

            “Think I’ll take my chances,’ Alastair says, and that’s all the confirmation Castiel and Uriel need.

            Uriel steps forward first, going after one of the lackey demons and showing him so hard against one of the barn’s wooden posts that the post cracks in two. The other lackey comes after him as well, but he can handle them, as long as Castiel takes on Alastair.

            He’s busy, and can’t exactly spare a lot of time to pay attention to Castiel, but Uriel still hears Alastair say “Sorry, kiddo. Why don’t you go run to Daddy?”

            That doesn’t sound good, and Uriel uses his powers to exorcise one of the demons, Heaven-bright light exploding out of his eyes as he screams his death.

            Uriel can hear Alastair’s voice chanting words, Enochian words, and they hadn’t counted on this, hadn’t counted on Alastair being powerful enough to resist them.

            The second lackey demon is putting up a valiant fight, preventing Uriel from getting to Castiel while at the same time not letting him get close enough for an exorcism, but even if he could get to Castiel, he does not know what to do.

            Maybe if Uriel was still an archangel, if he still had the power of the Seven, he could exorcise Alastair, but he does not. It’s not as if Alastair can kill Castiel, merely send him back to Heaven, but all Alastair needs is to get rid of them for a moment, and then he can take Annael.

            Uriel will not allow that to happen.

            It is Dean Winchester who comes to their rescue, even though Uriel had never once considered that he could be helpful. It’s neither elegant, nor particularly effective, as far as rescues go, with Dean simply hitting Alastair with a crowbar, but it does cause Alastair to drop Castiel, exorcism incomplete.

            “Dean, Dean, Dean,” Uriel hears Alastair say. “I am so disappointed. You had such promise!”

            Uriel cannot see what he does next, but he hears the choking noises, and he surmises that it cannot be good.

            They are running out of time, out of options, so naturally, it is Annael who saves them, showing the sort of tactical skills that had made her such a good garrison commander, all those years ago.

            Uriel is distracted when it happens, has finally managed to pin the second lackey demon down to the ground and lay a hand on his forehead. He sees a flash of red, feels a tug on his neck, and shouts a knee-jerk “No!”

            Annael has made off with the Grace, and without any hesitation, she throws the vial on the ground, shattering the fragile glass.

            Uriel can only watch, stunned, as the Grace rises from the ground, recognizing where it belongs instantly. It winds up to Annael’s mouth in a slow, sinuous curve, and Annael collapses to the ground, human body unable to handle the force of the angelic power.

            “Shut your eyes!” Annael screams for the benefit of the humans in the room as she returns to her feet. The pure white light is climbing up her body, and as it bursts out of her eyes and mouth, she raises her face towards the sky, letting out a wordless shriek.

            Her human body lasts for a few more seconds, then disappears as the light is thrown outwards, power meeting Alastair and blowing him away easily. Sam, Dean, and Ruby are all cowering on the floor, covering their heads, and Castiel hasn’t managed to stand up after Alastair’s onslaught, so Uriel is left standing alone, straight and tall, looking at the spot that Annael had occupied just milliseconds before.

            They all stay silent for a moment. Uriel can hardly believe it. Just like that, she’s back to full power, an archangel, a member of the Seven. She could be halfway across the world right now, back in Heaven, back in _time_. That’s why he finds it so ridiculous that Dean, the first person to get his bravado back, says, “Well, what are you guys waiting for? Go get Anna. Unless, of course, you’re scared.”

            As though it’s so simple, as though they can merely snap their fingers and capture her. Uriel wonders, for a moment, why Annael did not see fit to tell them that she is an archangel. Almost immediately, though, he dismisses the thought – it isn’t as though they would know what that meant. “This isn’t over,” he promises.

            “Oh, it looks over to me, junkless,” Dean says, and Uriel and Castiel leave.

***

            Uriel fully expected to die, after God finally put a stop to his rampage. After all, no other angel had ever disobeyed in a manner so spectacular, and the only one who had come close had been cast out of Heaven for good.

            What happened instead made him wish that he had been killed, or sent down to Hell to join Lucifer.

            Demoted. Uriel hadn’t even known that could happen, though he supposed, bitterly, that God could do anything he pleased. After millennia of being part of a tight-knit, exclusive family, being one of the most powerful beings in existence, he was suddenly lesser.

            It was as though he was enclosed inside invisible chains. The power that hummed just below the surface of every angel’s consciousness was muted, like a glowing ember rather than the raging inferno it had been before. It was as though Uriel had lost one of his senses, like he was now doomed to go through life blind or deaf.

            Worse than that, though, was the loss of the sense of community he had always felt with the rest of the Seven, the horrified looks that they had given him when he had been dragged back to Heaven in disGrace.

            The horrified look that _Annael_ had given him.

            He sat in his own little corner of Heaven, alone, staring at nothing. Despite everything, he couldn’t really bring himself to regret what had happened. Just thinking about what that old drunk man had said still caused a hot rush of anger to go through him, and he was certain that he had never felt more powerful or more in control than he had when he was leveling the cities.

            “Why did you do it?” a quiet voice said behind him, and Uriel started; he’d been so lost in his own thoughts that he hadn’t registered that he was no longer alone.

            “They were sinful,” he replied, refusing to look at his companion. “They disgusted me.”

            Annael sat beside him. He could see her studying him out of the corner of his eye, the look on her face pensive. “You disobeyed,” she said. “And what you did to those poor people…” she trailed off into silence.

            “I may have gone a bit overboard,” Uriel acknowledged, finally turning to look at her. “I suppose I lost my temper.”

            Annael snorted. “I’ll say.” They sat in silence for a moment.

            “Are you angry with me?” Uriel asked. He was afraid of the answer, but he knew, deep down, that Annael could not stay upset with him for long. They were too connected, too in sync for that, even with Uriel’s power so diminished.

            “I should be,” Annael said. “I am, a little. But I was watching. I heard what they said, and I understand why you got angry.”

            Uriel met her eyes, shocked at how quickly she was seeming to forgive him. She gave him a rueful smile. “As for the disobeying,” she said. “Call me blasphemous, but that doesn’t much matter to me.”

            Throughout is long existence, Uriel had become used to the way he and Annael were so perfect for each other, but every once in a while, she still managed to surprise him. He smiled at her, and leaned forwards so that their foreheads were touching.

            “I hate that I can’t feel you anymore,” Annael admitted softly. She was referring to the connection of the Seven, the connection that had been severed for Uriel, and Uriel wondered how it must feel for her, for the rest. Not as bad as for him, certainly, but it still must have been odd, to be able to feel the power of all but one.

            “You won’t need to,” Uriel assured her. “I’ll always be right here.”

***

            It’s after Annael’s re-ascension that things get complicated.

            Uriel has suspected, for quite a long time, that things are not all what they seem when it comes to their orders. He simply hasn’t cared, but now that he knows Annael is out there again, he needs something to focus on, something that isn’t how much he wants to go out and find her.

            So Uriel gets creative.

            The angels that are planning this, everything, Michael and Zachariah, underestimate him. Though they know he was once one of the Seven, was once almost as powerful as Michael himself, they still treat him like a seraph, like something to be ordered around and commanded, like simply a weapon to be wielded.

            The truth is, they are losing. The seals are breaking at an accelerated rate and, more and more with each day that passes, Uriel is thinking that it might not be such a bad thing.

            Annael has come back, has been restored, and that means that Heaven is more complete than it has been for a long time. True, no one knows where Gabriel or Azrael are, no one has seen either of them in millennia, but Uriel cannot help but think that maybe, just maybe, they might come back if Lucifer does.

            Uriel has never seen the face of God; even among the Seven, that was a privilege, and only three of them have seen Him.

            Three of the Seven, and Lucifer.

            So how does he even know there _is_ a god? He doesn’t, really, and he certainly does not know that God is giving the orders right now.

            Uriel cannot pinpoint the exact moment that he decides to rebel again, but the second he makes this decision, he knows exactly what to do.

            He goes to Ambriel and Simiel first: though he has not spoken to them in a long time, he knows that they are two of the ones he can count on the most. Simiel was at Sodom and Gomorrah, after all, and Ambriel had been one of the ones to take his side in the aftermath.

            Ambriel is a bloodthirsty thing, always has been, and he consents readily enough. But Simiel is a problem, the decades of relative peace making him soft, and he staunchly refuses, threatening to go to Michael and expose Uriel’s plan.

            Uriel has killed millions of humans, without blinking an eye, but when he pulls his blade out and stabs Simiel in the chest, it is the first time he has killed one of his brethren.

            “You did the right thing, brother,” is what Ambriel has to say when Uriel tells him. It does not make Uriel feel better, but neither does it make him stop.

            It takes about a week in Earth time for Heaven to recognize that something is wrong, which is a testament to just how distracting this seal business is. In that time, Uriel manages to convert three more angels – Zophiel, Gadreel, and Jehoel, and he is not overly excited about any of them – but he has had to kill six more.

            Ariel. Daniel. Hadraniel. Jegudiel. Muriel.

            They are all from his garrison in the old days, and he does not feel good about killing any of them, but it is the last, Barachiel, that weighs on his conscience the most.

            She agrees to meet him on Earth, but refuses to yield. Uriel attacks her, but she gets away from their meeting place, runs out into the street. Uriel gives chase, because he cannot let her get away, cannot let her give him away. She’s crying, pleading with him, screaming, and yet he drives his blade into her throat anyway, causing her to make a terrible gurgling noise as her Grace leaves her body.

            It is, of course, very soon after Barachiel’s death that Castiel appears next to Uriel, who had thankfully had the presence of mind to clean himself of his sister’s blood and is now sitting in a cafe.

            “Have you heard?” Castiel asks abruptly. Uriel knows he must be in pain – a garrison is like a family, and even though their garrison hasn’t been very cohesive since Annael fell, Castiel must still feel the death of each angel like a knife in his own chest.

            Uriel forces his vessel’s face into a look of sorrow. It’s not that he doesn’t _feel_ sorrow, it is just difficult to show any emotion other than guilt. “I have,” he says. “Barachiel was one of the best of us.”

            Castiel heaves a deep, shuddering breath. “She was,” he acknowledges. “This has to end. Michael has captured Alastair.”

            It seems a non-sequitur, until Uriel realizes that the other angels must think this the work of demons. It’s rather stupid of them, as everyone knows that the only thing that can kill an angel is another angel, and so Uriel is immediately suspicious. He had expected, when he’d started this, to be facing accusations within hours, but it seems that he will instead be one of those in charge of investigating this.

            “They cannot get him to talk,” Castiel says then. “They want us to – to ask Dean to interrogate him for us.”

            He looks even more torn up about this fact than he had about Barachiel’s death, and Uriel resists the urge to roll his eyes. He is supposed to be grieving, after all. “Then we’ll fetch him,” he says.

            “Uriel, they _cannot_ ask him to do this,” Castiel says desperately. “You know how badly Hell affected him.”

            Uriel does not, and nor does he care. “Orders are orders, Castiel,” Uriel says.

            Castiel pauses for a moment, then nods. “I suppose you’re right.”

***

            Castiel will have to be the next one he tries to convert, Uriel decides. It is too dangerous, with the amount of time he spends around Castiel, to keep him in the dark.

            It will be a difficult task, he knows. The Winchesters are diametrically opposed to Uriel’s mission, and, if what he has seen today is any indication, Castiel’s attachment to Dean has begun to affect his judgment.

            It was bad enough that Castiel was reluctant to use Dean as a torturer – as though Dean is anything outside of his usefulness to them – but then, after they’d transported him to where they had Alastair, Dean had said “I want to talk to Cas alone.”

            Uriel had thought that Castiel’s infatuation with Dean Winchester was one-sided, a case of hero worship brought on by his status as the Righteous Man.

            Now, he’s not so sure, because it had seemed, just for a moment, as though Dean, Dean Winchester who rails against Heaven at every opportunity, actually _trusted_ Castiel.

            But Uriel has an advantage over Dean: history. He has known Castiel for millennia, and if he could get Castiel to agree to let Dean torture, he has no doubt that he will be able to get Castiel to agree to his cause.

            First, though, he has to release Alastair. He cannot have his superiors knowing that it isn’t a demon killing his brothers, after all.

            And if Alastair ends up killing Dean before Castiel can subdue him? Well, that will just make Uriel’s job easier.

            A little turn of the wrist is all it takes, a little expenditure of power.

***

            Uriel is sitting on a bench when Castiel appears beside him with a whisper of wings. Dean is still alive, unfortunately, but Alastair is dead, and what’s more, Sam had shown his true power in doing so. It is time to try and sway Castiel to his side.

            “Castiel, I received revelation from our superiors,” Uriel says. “Our brothers and sisters are dying, and they…they want us to stop hunting the demon responsible.” He injects as much confusion and pain into the words as he possibly can. “Something is wrong up there. I mean, can you feel it?” He’s a bit worried he’s overdone it, at least until Castiel replies.

            “The murders,” he says slowly. “Maybe they aren’t demonic. Sam Winchester said the demons have nothing to do with it.”

            Wonderful. Now Castiel is not only obsessed with Dean, but he’s also taking Sam’s advice. “If not the demons, what could it be?” Uriel asks.

            “The will of Heaven,” Castiel says, and Uriel cocks his head to one side, because he cannot say he sees Castiel’s logic on this matter. “We are failing, Uriel. We are losing the war. Perhaps the garrison is being punished.”

            “You think our father would -” Uriel says, shocked. Certainly, he is a murderer of his own race, but he cannot bring himself to believe God would ever do something like this.

            “I think maybe our father isn’t giving the orders anymore,” Castiel says, and Uriel feels a rush of hope. He’d expected to have to convince Castiel that something is off, but it seems that this torture mission has rattled him more than Uriel thought. “Maybe there is something wrong.”

            Uriel wants to give his pitch right now, but he senses that Castiel is too raw to listen to him right now. After all, Dean Winchester has been beaten half to death as a result of Uriel’s actions. “Well, I won’t wait to be gutted,” he says instead, getting off the bench and vanishing.

***

            When Castiel calls him back a short while later, Uriel is a bit surprised, but he goes, because he knows that now is the time to put his plan into action. “You called?” Uriel says. “What do you say, Castiel? Will you join me? Will you fight with me?”

            They are standing in the room where they had held Alastair, the room with the ruined Devil’s trap.

            “Strange,” Castiel says, ignoring Uriel’s question entirely. “Strange how a leaky pipe can undo the work of angels when we ourselves are supposed to be the agents of fate.”

            So Castiel has discovered the reason the trap failed, then. “Alastair was much more powerful than we had imagined,” he says carefully.

            “No,” Castiel says. His voice is sharp, and when he raises his eyes to Uriel’s, they are sharp as well. Uriel feels a chill; found out, then. “No demon can overpower that trap. I made it myself. We’ve been friends for a long time, Uriel. Fought by each other’s sides, served together away from home, for what seems like forever. We’re brothers, Uriel. Pay me that respect. Tell me the truth.”

            Castiel’s words call up pictures in Uriel’s mind. Pictures of a better time, before Annael Fell, before the Seals and the Apocalypse, before Uriel was a killer. It is almost enough to make Uriel repent.

            Almost.

            “The truth is, the only thing that can kill an angel,” Uriel says, preparing his sword. He does not think this conversation will go his way, but he must try. “Is another angel.”

            “You,” Castiel says, and even though he must have suspected, must have come to the correct conclusion, his eyes are still wide and surprised, full of betrayal. In that one word, his “you,” Uriel can hear so many other words: “ _Simiel. Ariel. Daniel. Hadraniel. Jegudiel. Muriel. Barachiel._ ”

            “I’m afraid so,” he says quietly.

            “And you broke the devil’s trap, set Alastair on Dean,” Castiel says, and Uriel wonders if he realizes that he is giving that fact more weight than the murders.

            “Alastair should never have been taken alive,” Uriel says, by way of explanation. “Really inconvenient, Cas. Yes, I did turn the screw a little. Alastair should have killed Dean and escaped, and you should have gone on happily scapegoating the demons.” Uriel barely even notices that he uses Dean’s nickname for Castiel; he’s so focused on the task at hand.

            “For the murders of our kin?” Castiel asks incredulously. Uriel wonders why he has not drawn his own blade yet.

            “Not murders, Castiel, no,” Uriel says, because they had never been in cold blood. “My work is conversion. How long have we waited here? How long have we played the game by rules that make no sense?” For over two thousand years, he thinks.

            “It is our father’s world, Uriel,” Castiel says, but he looks uncertain.

            “Our father?” Uriel says, frustrated. “He stopped being that, if he ever was, the moment he created them. Humanity, his favorites. The whining, puking larva.”

            It’s the farthest Uriel has ever gone, the most explicit blasphemy, and he hadn’t even been able to fully admit these feelings to himself until he said them out loud. Now that he has, though, he recognizes how true it is. It is unfair. God, Heaven, everything. So unfair.

            And no angel would know this better than Uriel.

            “Are you trying to convert me?” Castiel asks.

            “I wanted you to join me,” Uriel says. He does not give the names of those he has already converted, not yet. “With you, we can be powerful enough to -”

            “To…” Castiel asks slowly, brows furrowing, and he really does not know how much power he holds now, does he? He is middle-of-the-road when it comes to the angelic power, but he is the one who pulled the Righteous Man out of Hell; he is in a much better position to influence his brothers than Uriel is.

            “To raise our brother,” Uriel says.

            “Lucifer.” Castiel’s voice is devoid of emotion, and Uriel cannot tell what he is thinking.

            “You do remember him?” Uriel presses, because even if Castiel hadn’t known Lucifer as well as Uriel had, he had still been alive, then, still been _there_. “How strong he was? How beautiful? And he didn’t bow to humanity. He was punished for defending us,” _as I was_. “Now, if you want to believe in something, Cas, I believe in him.”

            “Lucifer is not God,” Castiel says, and it seems that his role in this conversation has been temporarily reduced to parroting and inane observations.

            “God isn’t God anymore,” Uriel says, impatient. “He doesn’t care what we do. I am proof of that.” In the old days, God would have struck him down before he could kill one angel, let alone seven.

            “But this?” Castiel asks, eyes full of pain. “What were you going to do, Uriel? Were you going to kill the whole garrison?”

            “I only killed the ones who said no,” Uriel argues, neglecting to mention how many more had said no than yes. “Others have joined me, Cas. Now, please, brother, don’t fight me. Help me. Help me spread the word. Help me bring on the Apocalypse. All you have to do is be unafraid.”

            “For the first time in a long time, I am,” Castiel answers, and Uriel has a moment of blinding joy, joy that he will not have to kill one of his favorite brothers, before Castiel punches him so hard that he flies back through the nearest wall.

            This is the way it will be then. Uriel stands up, and they grapple, and though Castiel is a good fighter, Uriel was once one of the Seven, and not all of that power is gone. He hits Castiel with a metal bar, and Castiel goes down to his knees, his vessel’s face smeared with blood.

            “You can’t win, Uriel,” Castiel says, still defiant. “I still serve God.”

            Uriel wants to keep arguing, wants to try one more time to convince Castiel. But he has chosen his path, and he must be firm. He cannot afford emotion, not anymore. “You haven’t even met the man,” he says. “There is no will. No wrath. No God.” He raises his hand, to punch Castiel one more time, to knock him to the ground so that he can kill him, and then he feels a blinding pain in his throat and a sweet, excruciatingly familiar sensation.

            “Maybe, or maybe not,” Annael hisses, voice full of the old wrath, and Uriel wishes she was in front of him, because her eyes are likely blazing, and that is a beautiful sight. “But there’s still me.”

            On the last word, Annael pulls the sword out of Uriel’s neck, and then he feels no more.

***

            It was a few years before Annael’s fall that Uriel began to get the flashes.

            It wasn’t unheard of for this to happen, for angels to see glimpses of something that is happening in an alternate timeline. It was the result of time travel, of angels skipping around through time like they moved through space, crossing and intersecting with each other and altering the universe just a little bit each time.

            Uriel usually ignored them, as he ignored most things, but the particular events that he was seeing were so awful, so disturbing, that he could not help but dwell on them.

            They were innocuous, at first. He saw himself approached by Annael, in a redheaded vessel, saw her lips move as she presumably asked him for a favor, though these visions did not come with sound.

            He saw the two of them approaching a nondescript house, saw a human woman and man who were presumably the object of their mission. He saw flashes of a desperate fight.

            And then he saw the male human, blazing with angelic light, stand up and lay his hand on Annael. He saw her Grace destroyed from the inside out, saw the doe-like eyes of her vessel widen in fear and pain.

            He saw her light go out, and nothing, nothing, could possibly be worse than that.

            Annael had already started to withdraw from the other angels at that point, even the rest of the Seven, but she and Uriel were still close, still exactly as they’d been in the early days, so he did not hesitate to tell her about what he had seen.

            She reassured him, reminding him that flashes of alternate timelines were not necessarily going to happen. She told him that she wasn’t going anywhere, that she would always be there for him, the two of them as one, together in all things.

            And then, only a short time later, she turned to him and said “I’m sorry,” before reaching into herself and pulling out her own Grace, screaming in pain and loss as she hurled down to Earth.

            Things never were quite the same, after that.


	6. The Book of Annael

[15]

 _Annael_ – this was another voice,

hardly a voice, a breath, a whisper,

 

and I remembered bell-notes,

 _Azrael_ , _Gabriel_ , _Raphael_ ,

 

as when in Venice, one of the campanili

speaks and another answers,

 

until it seems the whole city (Venice-Venus)

will be covered with gold pollen shaken

 

from the bell-towers, lilies plundered

with the weight of massive bees…

[16]

 _Annael_ – and I remembered the sea-shell

and I remembered the empty lane

 

and I thought again of people,

daring the blinding rage

 

of the lightning, and I though,

t there is no shrine, no temple

 

in the city for that other, _Uriel_ ,

and I knew his companion,

 

companion of the fire-to-endure

was another fire, another candle,

 

was another of seven,

named among the seven Angels,

 

 _Annael_ ,

peace of God.

***

            It’s odd, Annael thinks, the divisions between human and angel.

            She’s still human, can still remember the life of Anna Milton – her parents, her childhood vacations to California beaches, the hours of Mass and summer school, the awkward high school years, the still-awkward-but-less-so college years.

            She sighs and stretches out her body. She’d never been hugely fond of it when her memories were all human – thought she was too skinny, too doe-eyed, sick of looking like a teenager at twenty-two.

            Now that she has her memories back, though, she marvels at it. She hadn’t taken many vessels before, preferring to lead her garrison from Heaven, but the humans had always fascinated her – such fragile little creatures, throwing themselves around like they’re invincible. Amazing.

            She shakes her head, henna-dyed hair whispering over her thin shoulders. Her head aches, even more so than when she’d first started tuning into angel radio. Human brains aren’t meant to take this kind of strain, aren’t meant to have millennia of memories inside them.

            The difference between the ways that time passes is odd as well. She’s been Anna Milton for twenty-two years, only about sixteen of which she can remember in any sort of meaningful way, and yet it somehow feels like she’s been human longer than she’d been an angel.

            She wonders if that will change when she gets her Grace back and shudders a little, drawing her jean-clad legs into her chest. It’s chilly outside, even with her jacket on, but she couldn’t stand being inside Bobby’s house anymore, couldn’t stand the way everyone was looking at her as though she would explode at any moment.

            She doesn’t want to go back, is the thing. She’d Fallen for a reason – it wasn’t exactly a spur-of-the-moment decision, ripping out a large part of her being and starting over with no memories. Heaven has been unbearable for nearly as long as she could remember, but it wasn’t until Michael began to turn to some of the lower angels that she had decided it was time to leave.

            One of her hands curls into a loose fist, muscle memory imitating the position she’d use to hold her blade. All her friends and allies: gone. Some in a literal sense: no one’s seen Gabriel since the times of Christ, countless lesser angels have died, and Azrael had practically melted into thin air. Some in a figurative sense: Michael, hard and distant, the years since Lucifer increasing his pain rather than decreasing it, Raphael and Zadkiel withdrawing into themselves, and Uriel…

            Uriel.

            It had hurt, more than anything in a long time, to see Uriel like that. Castiel, she can understand: a little seraph, given command for the first time, after having pulled the Righteous Man out of Hell…he had to be afraid to make the slightest misstep, for fear of being demoted from one of the most important jobs in history.

            But Uriel had been one of the Seven, once. No, not just one of the Seven: the one of the Seven that Annael was closest with.

            She had never been one of those who were close with Lucifer: she left that to Gabriel and Michael, but Uriel had been what humans would term as her best friend. They had flown missions together, spent their down time in Heaven together, and Annael had been one of the few angels – and certainly the only one of the Seven – to forgive Uriel after Sodom and Gomorrah.

            The idea that he could just turn on her like that, could be willing to kill her without a thought, history notwithstanding, made Anna want go back to the time when angels were just a metaphor told by the church, not real, live beings.

            Real, live beings that she very nearly despises, and now she’ll have to go back to being one of them. She can feel it beating at the back of her brain, can feel her knowledge expanding by the minute. She should get out of here, really, because if she doesn’t get her Grace back within a few days, if she doesn’t get back to a state where she’s built to withstand this, the results will be very nearly nuclear.

            It’s not like she expects to live that long, anyway. Maybe she should just let them take her.

            She’s been looking out over Bobby’s scrap yard for so long, eyes passing over the hulking masses of car parts, strange and twisted in the half-light, that it takes her a moment to register than Dean is walking towards her.

            “Pamela get home okay?” she asks as soon as she does, forcing her voice not to give away her black thoughts. She really does care; Pamela had been kind to her, before the angel thing was revealed, and Anna can hardly blame her for being unable to stomach angels so soon after Castiel had burned her eyes out.

            (She doesn’t blame Castiel for that, either: Annael’s nickname may have been “The Peace of God,” but she’s burned out her fair share of eyes in her time, and more than that besides.)

            It’s as though Dean can read her mind, settling down next to her on the scrap heap, clearing his throat and tucking his hands into his pockets. “Yeah, she said she was sorry. It’s just after last time, she, uh…This is just a little too rich for her blood.”

            Dean sounds genuinely regretful, and Anna is voicing her thoughts before she can stop herself. Damn human self-control. “I don’t blame her. You guys should do the same.”

            And they should, because a fallen archangel is the last thing they should have to deal with, in the midst of the world going to complete shit.

            “Well, we’re not that smart,” Dean says with a self-deprecating smile, and Anna wants to protest, wants to tell Dean just how smart and kind and _important_ he is, but she doubts he’ll take it well.

            Her suspicions are affirmed when Dean continues, “Can I ask you something? What do they want me for? Why did they save me?” He shifts uncomfortably as he speaks, eyes firmly on the ground.

            “I’m sorry, the angels aren’t talking about it.” It’s not a lie. “And it was after I fell.” But that part is.

            All of the Seven know why Dean Winchester must be saved. Every member of the Seven has known, from the beginning, that Dean Winchester will be Michael’s chosen vessel, will end the Apocalypse and send Lucifer back to Hell for good.

            When Annael had been in Heaven, she’d thought this was a good thing. How could it be otherwise, when Lucifer was so evil and Michael was a force for good?

            But she’s been living on earth for twenty-two years. And those statistics they’d rattled off in Heaven: “a few humans may die, a couple of million, a billion – it’s all for the greater good,” those statistics that had seemed so reasonable and acceptable, even to what Uriel termed a “mud-monkey sympathizer” like Annael, were now completely out of the question.

            She thinks of her human parents, her mother’s smile and her father’s laugh, and a lump rises unbidden to her throat. Her new (old) memories have not replaced those of when she was human, and she misses them fiercely. She’s unable to mourn them properly, though, now that she has so much else to deal with, and she makes a silent vow to herself to make sure their souls have gone safely to Heaven.

            If the other angels don’t kill her first, that is.

            Dean continues speaking, unaware of the tangent Anna’s mind has just gone on. “That’s another question,” he says “Why would you fall? Why would you want to be one of us?”

            Anna is stricken almost speechless. “You don’t mean that,” she says weakly.

            “I don’t?” Dean turns to her long enough to arch a skeptical eyebrow, before turning back to face forward, looking out over the cars again. “A bunch of – of miserable bastards…Eating, crapping, confused, afraid.”

            Anna realizes that humans can’t exactly see the big picture here, and that Dean has only the barest minimum of interactions with angels under his belt, but she still wants to shake some sense into him. “I don’t know,” she replies, dredging up her training to force herself into diplomacy. “There’s loyalty…forgiveness…love.” All things, she thinks bitterly, that angels don’t understand.

            “Pain,” Dean counters. Does he really think that humans are the only creatures to feel that? Even goldfish can feel pain.

            Anna bites her tongue again. “Chocolate cake,” she says flippantly.

            Dean refuses to be dissuaded. “Guilt,” he says, and though Anna’s superior senses haven’t returned with her memory, she knows that he must be reeking of it.

            There’s one sure-fire way she knows to cheer men like Dean up, though. “Sex.”

            Dean inclines his head towards her, lazy half-smile coming over his handsome face. “Yeah, you got me there.” His eyes rove very obviously over what little of Anna’s body he can see, covered, as it is, by clothing and hunched into a seated position.

            Anna reminds herself that having sex with Michael’s true vessel is likely frowned upon by Heaven, and gets back to the point. “I mean it,” she says. “Every emotion, Dean, even the bad ones…it’s why I fell. It’s why…why I’d give anything not to have to go back. Anything.”

            “Feelings are overrated, if you ask me,” Dean says quietly, and Anna almost laughs, because Dean must be one of the most emotionally motivated people she’s ever met, and she spent a lot of her human life around devoutly religious people, so that’s saying something. She knows he must be thinking of Hell, though, must be thinking of what he was forced to go through, and she knows that for a person with so much empathy, the Pit must have left scars so deep that they may never heal.

            “Beats being an angel,” Anna says, voice softening as well.

            “How’s that possible? You guys are powerful and perfect. You don’t doubt yourselves or God or anything.”

            That’s the problem, Anna thinks. There’s nothing worse than someone who can never be convinced that they’re wrong. Look what it did to Lucifer, to Uriel.

            “Perfect…like a marble statue,” Anna says bitterly. She’s exaggerating a little bit, both for Dean’s sake and because emotions felt as an angel are nothing like those felt as a human, but she can’t help herself. “Cold…no choice…only obedience. Dean, do you know how many angels have actually seen God? Seen his face?”

            “All of you?” Dean guesses.

            “Four angels. Four,” Anna says. “And I’m not one of them.”

            She isn’t, and she’s always wondered why the Seven, supposedly God’s nearest and dearest children, haven’t, when Lucifer has.

            Michael, Lucifer, Gabriel, and Raphael. Four angels that have seen the face of God, and one of them is the biggest traitor ever, and not even an archangel to boot.

            “That’s it?” Dean asks, incredulous. “Well, then how do you know there even is a God?”

            She knows because she trusted Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael. Once.

            “We have to take it on faith…which we’re killed if we don’t have.” Okay, that’s a little extreme. Even under Michael and Zachariah’s new order, the one that had only been beginning when Anna fell, relied on re-education rather than execution – there are a finite number of angels in existence, after all. But Anna’s firmly on the side of the humans, now, and Dean needs to be as well, if he has any chance of stopping the senseless slaughter before it begins.

            “Huh,” Dean says.

            The non-committal noise infuriates Anna and she presses on, laying it on thicker and thicker by the moment. “I was stationed on earth for two thousand years. Just watching, silent, invisible…out on the road, sick for home, waiting on orders from an unknowable father that I can’t begin to understand. So don’t tell me that -”

            Her voice has gotten louder and a bit shrill as she speaks, because the longer she dwells on this the angrier she gets. She’s cut off by a low chuckle from Dean, though.

            “What’s so funny? What?” Anna demands.

            “Nothing. Sorry, it’s just…I can relate.”

            He really can’t, can’t even begin to compare his relationship with his own father, however shitty it may have been, with Anna’s to God, and she’s torn between continuing this argument or dropping it.

            She’s so tired. The weight of a thousand worlds has been dropped on her shoulders in the space of a few hours, and she has no idea what to do. She hates the Winchesters, just for a moment, for bringing her out of the oblivion that she had lived in for twenty-two years.

            She’s saved from a reply, though, by the arrival of Sam, bringing news of her Grace. Sighing, she unfolds herself from the seated position she’s been in for hours, ignoring the protests of her body. This is no longer about her, she reminds herself. It’s for the greater good.

            Time to be a warrior again, this time for humanity.

***

            Well, Anna thinks as she makes her way through the forest on light feet, towards where Dean is standing over the Impala, at least they tried.

            The search for her Grace was…disappointing, to say the least, and here she is, somewhere between an angel and a human, with thoughts and ideas and memories and knowledge that will burn her from the inside out, sooner rather than later. Yet somehow, despite all this, it is the idea of Dean’s disappointment, of Dean’s unhappiness, that presses most firmly on her mind.

            What can she say, she’s sentimental. Besides, Dean Winchester is important – not just in the way that Heaven means, not just to be a pawn in their game, their endless war against Hell, but because he’s a good person.

            He’s a kind person, one who tries his best to help others no matter what, one who’s been handed a horrible deal in life and continues on anyway. Take tonight for example – it would be easy for him to just hand her over to the angels or the demons, wash his hands of this and go back to his own life, and yet he continues to refuse, continues to risk being thrown back in the Pit, all for someone he barely knows.

            Hell, she barely knows herself.

            She comes up to where he can see her and he looks up from the book he’d been studying. “Hey. Holding up okay?” he asks.

            “Trying,” Anna says.

            Dean acknowledges her with a “Yeah” and a tilt of the head, and Anna continues. “A little scared, I guess. So, um, Dean…I just wanted to thank you.”

            “For what?” Dean asks, and that’s another good thing about him, because he’s actually, genuinely confused. He doesn’t seem to see how much he does for others, or doesn’t seem to think it matters, and it makes Anna alternately want to strangle him and kiss him.

            “Everything,” she says. “You guys – you didn’t have to help me.”

            “Hey, let’s can the ‘thanks for trying’ speech, you know?” Dean interrupts. “Participation trophies suck ass.”

            “I don’t know,” Anna says softly. “Maybe I don’t deserve to be saved.” It’s something that’s been niggling at the back of her mind since they discovered her Grace was gone. She doesn’t mean it to sound as sad as it comes out, but she’s an angel, one of the Seven, and a part of her will always long for home.

            Besides, she means ‘saved’ in a quite literal sense, though Dean doesn’t know that she has a ticking time bomb in her head, and she doesn’t intend to tell him.

            “Don’t talk like that,” Dean says, because he seems to think that he’s got the market cornered on self-hate.

            “I disobeyed,” Anna says flatly, because that’s what this comes down to. It had been her choice at the time, but part of the reason she chose to fall, chose oblivion, was that she wouldn’t be able to feel the guilt afterwards. “ _Lucifer_ disobeyed. It’s our murder one, and I knew it. Maybe I got to pay.”

            “Yeah, well, we’ve all done things we gotta pay for,” Dean says bitterly.

            Anna hesitates, because she knows that what she’s about to say won’t be taken very well. She’s had enough human experience to know Dean’s type, the strong and silent type, and knows that an acknowledgement of his weakness at the wrong time might cause him to close himself right off. “I got to tell you something,” she says. “You’re not gonna like it.”

            “Okay,” Dean says cautiously. “What?”

            “About a week ago, I heard the angels talking. About you, what you did in Hell.” Anna says. It’s a lie; angels don’t concern themselves with the doings of souls in Hell. The only thing they’d said was that the Righteous Man had broken, and Anna had been confused. But now that she’s got her memories back, she can fill in the blanks for herself. “I know. It wasn’t your fault. You should forgive yourself.”

            “Anna, I don’t want to – I can’t talk about that,” Dean says, stumbling slightly over his words. It’s the expected response, and Anna wants to ask him how he expects to lighten his burden if he never shares it, but she knows not to push.

            “I know,” she says instead, but can’t resist one last thing. “But when you can, you have people that want to help. You are not alone. That’s all I’m trying to say.”

            He looks so lost, so _lonely_ , that Anna’s heart aches, and even though she knows that she didn’t cause him to feel that way – that the guilt and self-hatred would have welled up within him regardless – she can’t help but want to ease his suffering, any way she can.

            She’s an attractive, twenty-two year old woman, and she’s sitting in front of a very attractive thirty-something man, and when she leans in and kisses him, there’s no trace of angel in her; this is all Anna Milton, no Annael.

            “What was that for?” Dean asks after she pulls away, but he looks less raw, less tormented.

            “You know,” Anna grins, recalling her college days, only a few months before, the lines that frat boys and barflies had always used. “Our last night on earth…all that.”

            Dean’s answering smirk lights up his whole face, makes him look much younger. “You’re stealing my best line,” he says, and then their lips meet again, the kiss slower and deeper this time.

            Anna’s body light up at his touch. It’s been too long, months since the angelic voices invaded her consciousness and took over her life, months since she traded a dorm room for a mental hospital. But here she is, mind clear for the first time in months, though a little more full than she’s comfortable with, with a wonderful man’s big, calloused hands cupping her face, tilting her head up into the kiss.

            When Dean breaks away and motions towards the Impala with his head, eyebrows raised nearly to his hairline, Anna laughs, but nods.

            “What’s so funny?” Dean asks as he opens the door, gesturing to Anna to go first.

            “Sex in the back of a car?” Anna says, light and teasing. “Not exactly classy, is it?” It’s a little uncomfortable wiggling into the backseat of the car, despite the fact that it’s bigger than most, and Anna abandons any hope of looking cute while doing it, choosing instead to just get in like she’s going on a road trip.

            “Hey, I’ll have you know that my baby is very classy,” Dean says, coming after her and closing the door behind him.

            “Should I leave you two alone, then?” Anna asks, even as she winds her arms around his neck and stretches her body out along the backseat, pulling him down on top of her.

            Dean doesn’t bother answering her question, choosing instead to kiss her for another long moment. With the position they’re in , Anna can feel the entire lengths of their bodies pressing together, chest to chest and one of Dean’s thighs slotting between hers.

            He rocks against her, then, slowly, as if to take measure of the situation, and then more quickly. Anna gasps, a flood of arousal going through her at the touch, and although it is not a warm night, she is suddenly far too hot.

            It’s as though Dean has read her mind, because as he sucks her lower lip into his mouth, he begins to push her jacket off her shoulders, lifting her up slightly to get it the rest of the way off. Not to be outdone, Anna gets her hands, which haven’t taken much part in the action until now, up under his shirt.

            Anna’s had sex before, of course she has, but it’s been with a lot of college guys, mostly the endearing, kind of geeky type, though she has gone for a frat boy or two. Still, none of them have been built like Dean is, strong from years on the job, and she finds that to be an incredible turn on.

            One thing she hasn’t done, though, is had sex while she remembered her life as an angel. As she and Dean finish getting undressed, kicking articles of clothing every which way, half of Anna’s mind is on how strange this feels. It’s like part of her, the human part, knows exactly what to do, is moving without thought, and enjoying it immensely. The other part, the angel part, isn’t _not_ enjoying it, exactly, but she cannot seem to give herself entirely over to the sensation, the way she has before.

            She had meant what she said earlier, despite it being framed as a joke: this likely is her last night on Earth, and therefore the only chance she will get to have sex with Dean. In light of that, she takes the time to catalogue his body in the half-light of the evening.

            The first thing she notices, besides the general hotness, is the tattoo on his upper chest. Anna’s never really been a tattoo kind of girl, preferring more clean-cut guys, but as this is clearly serving a purpose, she can’t bring herself to mind.

            The second thing she notices is much more worrying. She sees a flash of it out of the corner of her eye, at first, as Dean moves to kiss down her neck, and it’s on complete instinct that she reaches out to see it better.

            It’s a handprint, burned into his flesh, the skin pink and slightly raised. Anna runs her fingertips over it, shocked, before finally giving in and fitting her own hand to the mark. It’s larger than hers, and this confirms her suspicion: Castiel.

            Dean meets her eyes for a long moment as she touches the mark, and she can see how confused he is, how scared, how in over his head, all reflected in those green eyes.

            But it’s still her last night on earth, and so she just leans in to kiss Dean again and firmly shuts the angel part of her brain off.

***

            Of course, it ends up _not_ being Anna’s last night on earth, because if there is one thing the Winchesters are good at, it’s pulling off a last-minute victory.

            It was Ruby’s idea, really, and Anna has never been a friend to demons, never considered them worthy of her attention, but Ruby seems different. She genuinely seems interested in helping Anna, in a way that directly contradicts both their natures, and from the way Ruby’s eyes seem to follow Sam around the room constantly, she has real feelings for him.

            Anna doesn’t _like_ the plan when Ruby runs it by her, for almost more reasons than she can articulate, starting with the fact that it’ll mean Ruby has to get tortured and ending with the fact that it will be putting Castiel and Uriel in danger.

            “It’s not like I haven’t been tortured before, Pollyanna,” Ruby snarks in response to Anna’s concern. “You should’ve seen what I went through to prove to Lilith that I was trustworthy after the last time I got caught helping these two.” She gestures expansively to Sam and Dean, then crosses her arms over her chest. “I’m gonna do it whether you like it or not,” she says. “’Cause much as loverboy over there seems to think otherwise, this is actually not all about you. If the demons get ahold of you, they’ll have a huge tactical advantage in this war, and I don’t want that to happen.”

            Despite the harshness of her words, Anna gets the impression that Ruby cares. She’s mostly trained herself out of looking at Ruby’s demon face at this point, slavering hound jaws and slitted red eyes, though she sometimes gets a bit of a fright if she looks at Ruby out of the corner of her eye.

            Anna nods. “If you say so,” she says. “I don’t want Castiel and Uriel to get hurt either, though: they’re my brothers.”

            “They’re trying to kill you,” Dean interjects.

            Both Ruby and Anna ignore him. “What, you don’t trust your feathered friends to take on a couple of demons?” Ruby asks, raising an eyebrow.

            “If it’s only a couple, it shouldn’t be any problem,” Anna says. “But numbers can defeat all but the most powerful of angels, and neither Castiel or Uriel are particularly powerful.”

            “Were you?” Sam asks. “Before you Fell?”

            Anna has noticed that, of the three of them, Sam is the one most interested in her angelic past. Dean seems to think that his limited interactions with angels in the past means that he’s got the number of the entire species, and Ruby doesn’t give a fuck as long as they’re far away from her.

            Sam, though, still has some little spark of religion in him, despite all life has thrown at him, and he’s been asking Anna little questions like this, curious, but not too invasive, since she got her memory back.

            She smiles at him, now, because it’s humans like him that made her want to fall in the first place. “I was,” she says. “One of the most powerful, in fact.”

            Sam looks like he wants to ask more questions, but Ruby cuts him off. “Nice as it is that you two are getting acquainted,” she says. “Can we get back to the plan? If I’m gonna sacrifice myself, here, it had better not be for nothing.”

            So Sam looks away, and they plan, and a few hours later sees Sam, Dean, and Anna all standing in the barn as Uriel and Castiel arrive.

            Anna hadn’t been in the room the last time they’d stopped by, nor had she had her memories back. She had reacted entirely on instinct, drawing the sigil that banished them back to Heaven, without really being able to register their presence.

            Now, it’s like being slapped in the face, the first sighting she’s had of her own kind in twenty-two years.

            In the past, when she looked at angels in vessels, it was as though she didn’t even recognize the vessel, seeing the light within. She can still see that light now, but, as it is with Ruby, it is muffled, and she can see the vessel much more clearly than the angel.       

            Uriel’s vessel does not quite match what she remembers of his personality, a large, intimidating looking black man with a shaved head and a powerful jaw, standing there in a clean-cut suit that does nothing to disguise the power in his body.

            Castiel, on the other hand, matches so well with his vessel that it’s a wonder that she had never seen him in it before: a wiry man with windswept dark hair and big blue eyes, a serious set to his jaw and an awkward way of standing.

            The first thing Castiel does is greet her, as though he’s not the slightest bit ashamed of turning on her. She supposes that he isn’t, though; angels are never ashamed of following orders.

            Anna sticks to the plan, bravely stepping forward and offering herself up to the two of them. She can’t help pulling Dean in for a goodbye kiss, though, and while she’s kissing him, she opens her eyes, looks over Dean’s shoulders straight at Castiel.

            He’s definitely uncomfortable, though he looks as though he’s not quite sure why, which rules out it just being an aversion to sex. It’s as Anna suspected, then. She can’t really bring herself to be surprised, not after seeing his handprint on Dean’s arm. Even though she can count the number of humans who have been rescued from Hell by angels on one hand, she’s certain that it’s not actually normal to brand them in doing so.

            Curiosity sated, Anna fields Castiel’s apology and tells him to make it quick, resolutely ignoring the fact that she has not looked at Uriel this entire time.

            As per plan, that is when the demon shows up, and though Anna had known that Ruby would be in bad shape, she is still horrified when she sees her friend suspended between two other demons, bleeding from a wicked looking wound to her stomach and panting with the effort to keep herself upright despite the pain. She catches Anna’s eyes as the demons and angels begin their posturing, quirking her eyebrows and giving a humorless smirk, just before the demons toss her aside in order to step forward and fight.

            Anna wants to go to her, wants to make sure she’s alright, but this entire plan hinges on her, so she doesn’t, moving away from Ruby and focusing in on the battle at hand.

            It is Uriel she needs, so it is Uriel she watches, as he moves with more Grace than should be possible in such a bulky body and exorcises one of the demons, a look of sick pleasure twisting his face.

            It’s when Uriel overpowers the second demon that Anna sees her chance, darting forward while he’s distracted and snagging the chain hanging off his neck. She barely has time to register her own Grace in the tiny vial at the end of the chain, barely has time to marvel about how it seems to be a sentient entity, entirely separate from her, and how it seems to greet her with joy, like an old friend.

            She dashes to the middle of the room and throws the vial at the ground as hard as she can, hearing the satisfying tinkle of breaking glass before the Grace rises up from the floor and slams into her.

            Anna remembers tearing out her Grace, vaguely, sure, but she remembers it. The overwhelming memory is of pain, pain so bad that she thought she might die of it, and in contrast to even that memory, the pain that the Grace causes as it works inside her is not that bad at all.

            That does not mean it doesn’t hurt, though, and she nearly blacks out from it, unable to remember how she’d gone from standing to kneeling on the ground.

            As she stands up again, legs shaky, she can feel the Grace rising up inside her. The closest thing she can liken it to is one of the innumerable stomach flus she’d had as a child and teenager, but it is a poor analogy. This force, this part of her being, is remaking her from the inside out, and she’s entirely certain that it will be cataclysmic when it finally finishes.

            She has the presence of mind to call out “Shut your eyes!” repeatedly as she feels the Grace make its way up her throat. Through the pain, she half-remembers poor blind Pamela, cannot bear the thought of Sam or Dean being resigned to the same fate.

            There is a split second when the Grace has made it all the way up into her brain when it seems as if that will be it; the pain fades, and Anna is left standing there looking around at the room, full of angels and demons and humans, for just the smallest pocket of time before a burst of pure creation energy explodes out of her, an atomic explosion with her at the epicenter.

            And if Anna had thought that the memories that Pamela had loosened were her getting her old self back, she was sorely mistaken.

            It’s like she feels _right_ for the first time she can remember, and though she will certainly cherish her human memories, she already feels a distance from them. She is somewhere in the middle, she thinks, not quite the archangel Annael and not quite the human Anna Milton.

            When she flies away, it’s not entirely to avoid Uriel and Castiel, though that certainly plays a part in her motivation.

            After all, she’s just gotten a large part of her being back; she needs some time to think.

***

            In Enochian, the language of the angels, there is no term to distinguish between male and female. Why would there be? Angels were created before the concepts of sex and gender, and therefore have no need for these things.

            However, in any situation where angels have to refer to themselves using human terms, they nearly always default to the male pronouns – they are ‘he” or ‘him,” they are ‘brothers,” generalized as “man.”

            Annael had never liked this, which is why she had always made an effort to be “she,” to be “her,” to be “sister” and “woman.”

            This didn’t just apply to when she took a vessel, though more often than not, she did prefer to possess females, it also applied to her angelic form.

            Uriel would tease her for it, sometimes, but he always acquiesced to her wishes; even if Annael hadn’t been his superior, they were friends, and Uriel wasn’t always as hard as he would become.

            After all, weren’t some of the most important humans in God’s creation female? Eve, Mary, Sarah, Leah: the list went on.

            Annael liked to think herself one of them. She was sympathetic to the humans, after all, something else Uriel would tease her for.

            “You’d like to be a mud monkey yourself, wouldn’t you?” he would say, settling next to her.

            “God created me as he wished me to be,” Annael would say demurely, but she would exchange a knowing smile with Uriel anyway.

            It was several thousand years after Sodom and Gomorrah, about a thousand after the death of Christ, and the area that the humans called Europe was in turmoil, two different groups of humans fighting, each of whom called themselves warriors of God.

            Among them were the real warriors of God, Annael’s garrison, though they were under strict orders not to favor one side over the other.

            The conflict was silly; humans tended to put far too much stock into the written accounts of their religions, the Bible and the Quran, as though Allah was not the same being that the Christians worshiped, albeit under another name.

            Annael was in charge of twelve angels, including Uriel. They were mostly lesser seraphs, and Annael tended to treat them as what they were: soldiers, not friends or brothers.

            The lesser eleven did not question Annael’s close friendship with Uriel, because every angel knew the story of the Seven, knew how he had been demoted after Sodom and Gomorrah, knew how Annael was the only angel who stood beside him. Annael knew that this fact made Uriel uncomfortable, that he hated being a cautionary tale for the lesser angels, but despite her own friendship with Uriel, she knew he had done wrong, and so she did not comfort him. It wasn’t as though she could change things, anyway, couldn’t exactly make them better.

            What the lesser eleven did tend to question, though, in muttered asides and half-glances and subtle fidgeting, was how Annael, the angel assigned to be the bringer of peace and joy, could create such chaos, could lay waste to humanity without a second thought.

            She did have second thoughts, of course, she did mourn every human that she killed or injured, but the truth was that the world that God had created was no place for peace.

            Much as Annael loved the humans, she did not love their ignorance, their bloodthirsty nature, their stubbornness.

            Below her, a battle was raging on. Annael and the rest of her garrison waited, watching as the men went at each other with swords and arrows. The screams of horses and the groans of the injured and dying men filled the air. All around them was the sharp stench of blood, and buzzards had already begun to circle overhead, waiting for their opportunity to feed.

            The angels were in vessels, prepared to go down and help the fight. Annael’s vessel, like those of her garrison, was male. She chafed at that fact, but what was she to do? A woman on the battlefield would arouse suspicion in the humans, might cause her to be captured and burned at the stake. It wouldn’t kill her, of course, but neither would it be pleasant.

            She continued to look down at the battle, her brows pulled down over her eyes, her lower lip in between her teeth.

            She felt a gentle touch on her shoulder and whirled around finding herself face to face with Uriel. She smiled lightly at him, consciously trying to relax the tension in her shoulders.

            Uriel looked worried, and Annael knew without him saying anything that there were a variety of reasons for that. He was worried for her, certainly, for her mental state, but she could also tell by the way he couldn’t quite meet her eyes that the battle was reminding him of Sodom and Gomorrah, of his disobedience and the event that had almost led to the end of their friendship. She couldn’t quite blame him for that; she’d seen her fair share of battles by that point, and they were all the same. For all they claimed to be different, organized into nations that were separated by language and custom and dress, humans all died the same way.

            “I’m fine,” Annael assured Uriel in response to his unasked question. The deepness of her voice startled her momentarily, but she shook it off.

            “I don’t like this,” Uriel replied, lowering his voice to give them the illusion of a private conversation. Though he didn’t specify what he meant by _this_ , Anna understood instantly: much as Uriel disliked humans, this sort of senseless wholesale slaughter was unpleasant. Still, orders were orders, even if neither of them could parse out the rationale behind them.

            She gave him a slight smile. “Me either,” she said.

            Below, the battle was quite obviously turning in the favor of the Muslims. Annael heaved a gentle sigh, and raised her voice to include the lesser eleven in her command. “It’s time,” she said.

            She let the rest of them go in front of her, watching as they melted into the battle seamlessly and began to fight. Uriel was the last to go, and he paused, reaching out a hand to her.

            She took it, squeezed lightly, then dropped it and took a deep breath, allowing a mask to fall over her face.

            It was time to fight.

***

            It was around the fifteenth century, human time, that Annael found her pet project. Since the end of the Crusades, her garrison had been rather at loose ends, without anything to do. Certainly, human conflict had not ended, or even slowed down, but the garrison had not been ordered to interfere again.

            As she watched, Annael had developed an affinity of sorts with the French. Their language was beautiful, more genteel, in a way, than many of the others, and she enjoyed merely listening to them.

            The French and the English were locked in what seemed to be an eternal war, with the English claiming a right to the French throne that did not make sense. The conflict fascinated Annael, because it was so petty, so _human_. It did not have the gravitas that the Crusades had, though the humans liked to claim otherwise, with their high-minded rhetoric about divine rights to the throne and mandates from Heaven coming from both sides.

            As if God cared about who ruled over one inconsequential piece of land.

            Annael didn’t tell anyone else about her interest in the conflict. The Crusades had sort of been the final hurrah of the angels’ involvement in human affairs, and, as far as Annael knew, very few angels had even taken vessels in the last few centuries.

            Even Uriel, close as the two of them still were, did not know about the amount of interest Annael had in the French. She felt almost as though she was living two lives: the one that her brothers and sisters saw and the one that was just for her.

            There was one particular person, a French peasant girl that Annael found particularly fascinating. She didn’t know quite why: it wasn’t as though the girl had any particular natural charms. She wasn’t overtly intelligent, wasn’t endowed with any physical prowess, did not have any direction in life that Annael could see.

            Still, there was a strength of character in the girl that reminded Annael of herself, and it was this that caused Annael to take a vessel for the first time in centuries and touch down in the girl’s garden, late one summer night.

            The girl, Joan, was still a child, and she was the only one in the garden as Annael – in the body of the loveliest woman she could find in the correct bloodline – appeared to her.

            Joan was dressed in a simple child’s gown and had close-cropped brown hair, unusual for even one as young as she. Annael had witnessed what had happened when she’d made the decision to cut it all off herself, how her mother had yelled and her father had taken a switch to her, and how Joan had kept her head up, proudly, throughout the whole thing, secure in her convictions on even this silly thing. As Annael appeared, she jumped back in alarm, falling heavily to the ground.

            “Do not be alarmed,” Annael said, delighting in the sounds of the French words coming out of her mouth.

            Joan stood up cautiously, staying a few feet away from Annael. “Who are you?” she asked suspiciously.

            “I am an angel of the Lord,” Annael said, watching as Joan’s eyes got big.

            Joan moved cautiously closer. “An angel?” she asked. “Why are you here? What do you want from me?”

            Annael knelt down, trying to make herself look as unthreatening as possible. “What have you heard about the war against England?” she asked.

            “Father says girls aren’t supposed to know about that,” Joan replied immediately. Annael could tell that this was something that had been bothering her. “But I know that the English are trying to take over from the king. And I know that our village was burned down by people who want the English to win.”

            There was sadness in Joan’s eyes as she said this, and Annael remembered the time in question. Joan had been so young, barely ten, and it must have been as though her entire world was collapsing, as she watched everything come down around her.

            “I am here to tell you that God has a plan for you,” Annael said, rising back to her feet.

            Joan, a devout child, became, if possible, even more interested with those words. “For me?” she asked breathlessly, suddenly sounding almost impossibly young. A strange feeling went through Annael, but she ignored it. “What does He want me to do?”

            “He wants you to drive the English out of France,” Annael said solemnly. “He wants you to lead the charge, to command the French army. If you do this, you will succeed.”

            Joan’s eyebrows draw together. “But how am I supposed to do that?” she asked. “I am just a girl, no one will listen to me.”

            “The make them,” Annael said, and she left Joan there, alone in the garden.

***

            For the next four years, it was as though the old fire had returned to Annael. She trained her garrison with single-minded efficiency, she spent time with her various brothers and sisters, and, whenever she got a spare moment, she stole away to watch Joan.

            Joan, who was rising to the task Annael set for her admirably. Annael watched as she grew from a scared little girl to a confident, self-assured young woman. She trained in the arts of swordsmanship and riding, learned everything she could about politics and the conflict between the English and the French, and used more cunning than Annael had given her credit for to convince everyone in her village that she was chosen by God.

            By the time Joan was sixteen years old, now in adult clothing but still with that child’s haircut, she was ready.

            She exceeded Annael’s wildest fantasies. She established herself as the closest confidant to the French Dauphin. She led armies into battle, winning almost every time and gaining so much notoriety that even the most reactionary of the men did not dare to contradict her.

            Annael’s brothers and sisters took notice of her, of this upstart little girl who was smashing through the gender-based barriers that humans had set up. Though Annael had told no one about her interference, still afraid of what would happen if it were known that she had acted outside God’s orders, Uriel began to give her knowing looks whenever anyone mentioned Joan. She supposed it was rather obvious that she, the angel who had been the first to use female pronouns and had often lamented the position of human women, would have something to do with Joan.

            Still, it seemed that it was only Uriel that made the connection, and, for a while, Annael was convinced that she had done the right thing, that she had made things better for all of humanity.

            And then Joan, at the tender age of nineteen, was captured by the English, tried for and found guilty of witchcraft, and sentenced to death at the stake.

            Annael was trapped. The intense scrutiny of Joan meant that she could not secretly free her. Though God was remote in those days, he was still there, still in control, and Annael knew he would disapprove of her interfering with human justice. She had noticed Michael, God’s greatest instrument, watching her since Joan’s capture, and she cursed herself for ever thinking that she could have gotten away with this. God was all-knowing, after all, and despite thinking herself sneaky, she had certainly played right into His hands.

            So she was forced to watch as the English soldiers jeered and spit at Joan, as she was led to the stake and tied to it, wood thrown at her feet. She was forced to watch as Joan’s sentence was read out, as Joan’s eyes filled with fear.

            When the torch was thrown into the pile of wood, Annael could watch no longer.

***

            Though Anna remains plugged in to the war between Heaven and Hell, to the efforts to stop the Apocalypse, there is only so much she can do with a target painted squarely on her back.

            When she hears what they’re going to make Dean do, though, she cannot stay away any longer.

            She has heard about the deaths of the former members of her garrison, and she is grieving, of course she is (especially for Barachiel, sweet Barachiel who was one of the first to follow Annael’s lead and use female pronouns), but it does not justify what they are asking Dean to do.

            When she appears in the building where they’ve taken Dean, she is pleased to note that only Castiel is in the room. Certainly, the fact that Uriel is nowhere to be found is a bit concerning, but if she’s going for ease, here, it stands to reason that Castiel will be more easily convinced than Uriel to stop this madness.

            One look at Castiel’s face as he turns to face her confirms her suspicions. He looks torn, tired, his face pinched, and Anna can tell why. In the room right next to this, Dean has already begun to carry out his duty, and every few moments the demon Alastair screams or wails or groans in response to something Dean does to him. While Anna does not care even a little bit about Alastair’s pain, it hurts her very soul to imagine what Dean is going through.

            “Anna,” Castiel acknowledges, not sounding the least bit surprised that she’s shown up.

            “Hello, Castiel,” she replies, cold and formal, allowing some of the anger she feels to seep into her voice.

            “Your human body -” Castiel says, and if there was ever a diversionary tactic, this is it.

            Anna doesn’t allow herself to get distracted, though it’s an interesting tale that involves a lot of sneaking around. “It was destroyed, I know. But I guess I’m sentimental. Called in some old favors and…”

            “You shouldn’t be here,” Castiel says bluntly. “We still have orders to kill you.”

            It’s nice to know he cares, at least. “Somehow I don’t think you’ll try,” she says, then, “Where’s Uriel?” because she really does not need him walking in in the middle of this.

            “He went to receive revelation,” Castiel says, which is, frankly, bullshit.

            “Right.” Anna says flatly, and from the look in Castiel’s eyes, he knows that just as well as she does. “Why are you letting Dean do this?” she asks, tired of the waffling and dancing around the point.

            “He’s doing God’s work,” Castiel says.

            Anna scoffs. “Torturing? That’s God’s work?” Castiel hadn’t looked certain even when she’d come in and he is looking less so with each word she says. She presses a little harder, letting her voice turn low and pleading as she says, “Stop him, Cas, please,” using Dean’s nickname for him purposely. Then, appealing to the reluctant part of him, the part that still thinks in terms of missions and end goals, she adds, “Before you ruin the one real weapon you have.”

            “Who are we to question the will of God?” Castiel asks, even though he knows that Anna is perhaps the last angel who would have an answer to this, as she’s questioned the will of God quite thoroughly.

            “Unless this isn’t his will,” Anna says carefully.

            “Then where do the orders come from?” Castiel asks, though the fact that he isn’t railing against her right now means that the thought has already occurred to him. Anna didn’t expect anything less; Castiel has proven himself to be quite intelligent in a tactical sense, though his emotional intelligence could use some work.

            “I don’t know. One of our superiors, maybe, but not him.” This will be easier for Castiel than other angels, because he’s already had the experience of having a superior betray him; he knows the feeling.

            The both of them turn to the door to the next room, just looking for a long moment as Alastair makes a particularly horrible noise.

            “The father you love,” Anna says quietly. “You think he wants this? You think he’d ask this of you? You think this is righteous?” She can see every one of her words hit him as though they’re bullets from a gun, until he drops his eyes to the floor and refuses to meet hers any more.

            “What you’re feeling? It’s called doubt,” she says. She remembers her first time; the combination of complete horror that she was going against everything she’d ever been taught, mixed with the exhilaration of thinking for herself for the first time. She dares to reach her hand out and touch his, lightly. It’s not something they’ve ever done; even in their incorporeal state, angels are not tactile creatures, only letting a select few others touch them.

            Castiel’s hand, his vessel’s hand, is large and cool and he doesn’t seem to quite know what to do with it. “These orders are wrong and you know it,” Anna says. Victory is in sight, now, and she starts speaking faster, afraid she will lose the advantage she’s gained. “But you can do the right thing. You’re afraid, Cas. I was too. But together, we can still -”

            Castiel yanks his hand away from hers as though it has suddenly turned red-hot; he rounds on her, looking more animated than he has in this entire time, and Anna’s heart sinks as she realizes she’s lost him.

            “Together? I am nothing like you,” Castiel spits. “You Fell. Go.”

            “Cas,” Anna pleads, wanting to try one more time.

            Castiel meets her eyes. “Go,” he says, and Anna has no doubt that he will call their superiors if she does not, so she vanishes.

***

            She hangs around, just out of sight, growing more and more concerned every minute. She cannot bring herself to watch Dean torturing Alastair, and so does not realize something has gone wrong until it is too late, until Dean has already been beaten bloody and Sam has had to use the powers, given to him by the demon blood that Anna hadn’t been able to sense we was drinking when she was still human.

            She’s still reeling, wondering how this could have happened, when she hears Castiel call her name and appears on a cold back street in front of him.

            He looks terrible, worse by far than the last time she’d seen him, the guilt and pain obvious in every line of his face.

            “Decided to kill me after all?” Anna says, because she’s so angry and disappointed, and it’s a sick pleasure to take it out on Castiel.

            He doesn’t rise to the bait, though, simply saying, “I’m alone,” something that Anna had already known.

            “What do you want from me, Castiel?” Anna asks.

            “I’m considering disobedience,” Castiel says, and though it’s awful that it has had to come to this, Anna still feels a rush of satisfaction.

            “Good,” she says.

            “No, it isn’t,” Castiel snaps back, and she hadn’t thought it was possible for him to look more tortured, but he manages it. “For the first time, I feel…”

            “It gets worse,” Anna says, not unkindly. “Choosing your own course of action is confusing, terrifying.” She moves closer, puts a hand on Castiel’s shoulder, but he merely stares at her, and another rush of anger goes through her. She removes the hand and steps back. “That’s right. You’re too good for my help. I’m just trash. A walking blasphemy.” She turns abruptly on her heel, slightly ashamed of this burst of emotion, and makes to walk away, forgetting, for a moment, that she can just fly away, because she has not felt so human since she got her Grace back.

            “Anna,” Castiel calls after her, desperate, and she stops walking, willing to hear him out. “I don’t know what to do. Please tell me what to do.”

            Anna turns back to him. It’s a good start, but he’s clearly not quite ready. “Like the old days?” She asks. “No. I’m sorry. It’s time to think for yourself.” With that, she collects her emotions again and vanishes.

            She’s given Castiel a lot to think about, but she cannot force him to do anything. The next move will be up to him.

            Something tells her that this isn’t over, though, so she sticks even closer than before, following after Castiel like those horrible angels on the shoulder that humans are so fond of.

            It pays off, though a large part of Anna wishes it hadn’t, because she doesn’t think she’s ever been more horrified.

            Uriel killed them. _Uriel_ killed seven of his fellow angels. Uriel is planning on bringing Lucifer back.

            Anna feels like her insides have vanished. She feels empty and out of sorts, and the last thing she thinks before she manifests and shoves her blade mercilessly through Uriel’s neck is, _What did I expect, after Sodom and Gomorrah_?

***

            The hits just keep coming after that, and though most of Anna would love to just run and hide, she does miss the Winchesters. She misses the comparative calm and peace she’d experienced before the return of her Grace, even with Heaven and Hell breathing down her neck and herself helpless and days away from exploding, so when she hears that Castiel has gone missing, she jumps at the chance to speak with them.

            The appearing in the back of their car isn’t really necessary, but she gets joy from so few things now, cut off from humans and angels alike, still raw and smarting from Uriel’s betrayal, that she allows herself a bit of fun, popping in the backseat and giving a cheerful, “Hey, guys.”

            Dean yelps and jerks the steering wheel so hard that the car swerves, but he has reflexes built up from years of hunting and manages to get the car back under control before Anna has to intervene.

            “Smooth,” Anna comments, holding back a smile, and Dean turns around for a second to glare at her. “You ever try calling ahead?” he asks gruffly, and really, he should be used to angels popping in at inconvenient times by now. Castiel is even worse about it than she is.

            “I like the element of surprise,” she says absently, but that last thought has reminded her of the task and hand, and her mood is quickly plummeting again.

            “Well, you look terrific,” Dean says, and it feels like lifetimes ago that Anna slept with him, but there’s still the stirrings of desire there, buried underneath the millions of other fucking things she has to worry about.

            “Um, yeah, not the most appropriate time, Dean,” she says, ignoring Sam’s resulting smirk. “You let Jimmy get away?”

            A wayward vessel is never a good thing, and _Castiel’s_ wayward vessel is in for a world of trouble. Castiel has been less than discreet about his connection with Dean and Sam, and any demon worth their salt will have thought up the idea to go after him, try to squeeze information out of him while he’s not hosting a superpowered being.

            “Talk to ginormo here,” Dean grumbles. Anna supposes he means Sam, whom she remembers thinking is abnormally tall for a human, though getting her Grace back has sort of messed with her sense of scale.

            “Sam. You seem different,” Anna says stiffly. She is trying her best not to be judgmental here – Sam had helped her, after all, and she’d liked Ruby – but it’s hard not to treat Sam differently now that she knows what he’s been up to, especially since she has a strong suspicion that the demon blood is somehow related to how he managed to lose Jimmy.

            “Me? I don’t know,” Sam laughs nervously. “A haircut?”

            “That’s not what I’m talking about,” Anna says, and though it’s not her place to mention the demon blood to Dean, she still gives Sam a long, hard look before turning to the next order of business. “So what’d Jimmy tell you? He remember anything?”  
            “Why? What’s going on?” Dean asks.

            “It’s Cas,” Anna says. “He got sent back home. Well, more like dragged back.” She does not envy him, even though his punishment will be much lighter than hers will be if they ever manage to catch her.

            “To Heaven? That’s not a good thing?” Dean asks, although he sounds like he suspects otherwise.

            “No. That’s a very bad thing,” Anna says. She doesn’t think the English language even has the appropriate words to convey just how bad that is. Not just because Cas will get hurt, be in enormous physical and mental pain, but because it will more than likely reset all the progress she’d made on getting him to consider disobedience, set him right back to the factory settings. “Painfully, awfully bad. He must have seriously pissed someone off.”

            “Cas said he had something to tell me,” Dean says. He sounds concerned, and Anna is suddenly reminded of the way he’d acted when it was her who was in danger. “Something important.”

            “What?” Anna asks, because she’s willing to bet that that information was what got Castiel’s ass dragged back to Heaven, and that means she needs to know what it is, pronto.

            “I don’t know,” Dean says.

            “Does _Jimmy_ know?” Anna asks, though she’s not holding out hope; vessels are usually kinda out of it when they’re being ridden, though Jimmy has fared better than most vessels due to Castiel’s relatively low level of power.

            “I don’t think so,” Dean says.

            “You don’t _think_ so?” Anna says, frustrated. “Whatever it is, it’s huge. You gotta find out for sure.”

            “That’s why we’re going after Jimmy,” Sam says, which is not helpful.

            “That’s why you shouldn’t have let him go in the first place,” she says through her teeth. “He’s probably dead already.” She can’t deal with this anymore, and so she takes off, letting Sam and Dean clean up their own mess.

***

            Things go, quite literally, straight to Hell not long after, though Anna, at the end of it all, is more concerned about her own well-being than that of humanity.

            It starts when Dean finds out about the demon blood, which, of course, leads to a knock-out, drag-down, brother-on-brother fight that reminds Anna uncomfortably of Lucifer and Michael, in the old days.

            It seems, as well, that Heaven’s torture machine has worked quite well on Castiel; it’s not long after Dean finally gets Sam restrained, finally gets him somewhere to get all that poison out of his system, that Castiel lets him out, sets him loose.

            Sure, it’s entirely possible that he may succeed in killing Lilith and ending all of this, but Anna does not trust Heaven anymore, and she’s sure that their influence has come with a nasty side effect.

            She isn’t really thinking when she appears before Castiel, too angry on Dean’s behalf.

            “What did you do?” she asks as soon as she gets there, and she is immediately struck by the change in Castiel’s posture and bearing – any trace of the comfort that had arisen between them after Uriel’s betrayal is gone, and Castiel looks every inch the same angel that broke into that barn in Sioux Falls intent on killing her.

            “You shouldn’t have come, Anna,” Castiel says, his voice low and dangerous.

            Anna ignores the warning, stepping forward. If worst comes to worst, she can fight him; she’s an archangel, after all. “Why would you let out Sam Winchester?” she asks.

            “Those were my orders,” Castiel says, voice blank.

            “Orders?” Anna cries. “Cas, you saw him. He’s drinking demon blood. It’s so much worse than we thought. Dean was trying to stop him.” She’d convinced Castiel once; she’d just have to do it again.

            Castiel doesn’t give an inch. “You really shouldn’t have come,” he says, and before Anna can react, she finds her arms held fast and then she’s being flown away from earth and back towards the home she rejected twenty-two years ago.

***

            Castiel was part of Annael’s garrison from the time that Gabriel disappeared, but she never took particular notice of him. She didn’t take particular notice of any of her inferiors, not until after the end of the Hundred Years’ War and Joan, not until after she’d gotten over her grief and anger, or at least learned to bury it a little further under the surface.

            Castiel was refreshing, in a way. Unlike most of the other angels, and especially unlike the Seven, he did not seem to have a dark side, did not seem to have any sort of secret bitterness to him. Annael didn’t know if this was because of his relative youth and inexperience or because of something more innate, but speaking with him was like going back to the beginning, when everything was simple, when a love for God and each other was enough.

            Uriel didn’t approve of their friendship, because Uriel didn’t approve of anything. But he didn’t say anything, because he knew that he was still the one that Annael went to with any real issues, when she needed to vent or scream or cry, to rail against the unfairness of God’s creation.

            She couldn’t bring herself to taint Castiel with any of this, though as time went on and she saw various battles through with Castiel at her side, she began to think that maybe he couldn’t be tainted, that maybe he would never lose his absolute faith in God.

            She didn’t quite know if that was a good thing or a bad thing, if it spoke to a purity of heart or to a lack of intelligence and awareness. In any case, she envied him.

            Of course, it would come to pass later that even Castiel was not above pain and disillusionment. It was one more in the long, long list of things that Annael was wrong about.

***

            Both humans and angels like to think of Heaven as somehow better than Hell, as somehow above things like torture. And sure, when it comes to the humans who go to Heaven, it _is_ better, if a little monotonous.

            But for any angel who even thinks about disobeying? Well, that’s when the lines start getting blurred real fast.

            Before now, Anna has never even experienced the section of Heaven that houses the angels who need “re-education.” She remembers what it does to someone, though, remembers how Uriel had been after his time with the re-educators. More recently, she’s seen what’s happened to Castiel, albeit briefly.

            She’s still not entirely prepared for what she goes through.

            If you asked her to give you an estimate of how long she stays there, she wouldn’t be able to tell you, and, for the most part, she doesn’t even remember anything besides the pain. There are flashes, though – voices telling her to _obey_ , to _repent_ ; Zachariah’s face looming above her, smiling in savage glee, her very insides being reshaped.

            In the end, she breaks, because everyone does, and she has never been able to relate more to Dean than she does now.

            She’s a bit surprised, when she is let out of there, to be immediately asked to do a very important job. She remembers how no one had trusted Uriel to do anything for a long time after his re-education.

            Her mission is simple: get rid of Sam Winchester.

            The way to get to Sam will always, always be Dean, and so she makes her way into his dreams. She is rather unsurprised to find out that Dean dreams about strippers in disturbingly relevant costumes.

            “Anna?” he asks weakly when she makes herself known. Distantly, she remembers having had sex with him and shudders slightly. “I was just, uh, working on a case.”

            “This is what you dream about,” Anna deadpans in return, ignoring his weak attempt to deflect.

            “This is awkward,” Dean says. “Why are you gate-crashing my head? Why don’t you just swing by the motel?”

            She wishes she could, because that would make both her life and her mission that much simpler. She sits down next to Dean and admits, “I can’t find you.”

            “Oh,” Dean says. He gestures to his own torso. “Cas did this thing.”

            Anna focuses a little, looks through skin and muscle with ease, and sees the Enochian sigils carved into Dean’s ribs. A wave of anger crashes through her, and she thinks bitterly that Castiel probably likes that, likes having his handiwork carved into Dean’s bones as much as he likes having his handprint seared into Dean’s flesh.

            “Cas. Right.” Anna says. She’s still speaking in a flat tone of voice, and it seems like she cannot break out of that, cannot make herself sound more normal or more animated. She would be worried that Dean would notice, but judging by the fact that Dean doesn’t even seem to have noticed that she’s been missing for months, she doesn’t think he will. “Now, there’s a friend you can count on.”

            “What?” Dean asks, sounding like he cannot fathom the idea that his angel boyfriend could be anything less than one hundred percent trustworthy, despite all the times he’s betrayed him in the past. Oh, Anna has heard the story of what happened the night Lucifer rose again, how Castiel had disobeyed, all for Dean, gotten himself killed and then miraculously resurrected, but the fact remains that it is Castiel who let Sam out of the panic room in the first place, and she is annoyed by Dean’s apparent faith in him.

            “He didn’t tell you?” Anna asks, wondering if Castiel has told him about the Sam thing, either.

            “Tell me what?” Dean asks in return.

            “Where I’ve been,” Anna says, and she watches as her words hit Dean, as he realizes, for the first time, how long it’s been since he’s seen her. He starts to look slightly guilty, but Anna does not have time for this, does not have time to pander to Dean Winchester’s emotions, so she continues, effortlessly answering her own question. “Of course not. Why would he?”

            “Where _have_ you been?” Dean finally asks.

            “Prison. Upstairs.” Anna says shortly. Dean may be one of the few beings alive that can actually understand and relate to what she’s gone through, but she still does not want to talk about it. She can’t resist a dig, though, partially because it will make Dean believe she’s still on his side, and so she adds, “All the torture, twice the self-righteousness.”

            “Why wouldn’t he have told us where you were?” Dean asks, eyebrows drawing together like he’s being presented with a particularly difficult problem, instead of one where the answer is pretty fucking obvious.

            “Because he’s the one who turned me in,” Anna says simply, and though she does get a bit of sick satisfaction at the look that comes over Dean’s face in response, it doesn’t feel as good as she’d thought. “Don’t look so shocked. He was always a good little soldier. Did anything under orders.”  
            “I didn’t know,” Dean says, though what Anna hears is _I didn’t care_. “Are you okay?”

            “No,” Anna says, because Dean should know how inane and unhelpful that question is. “And I don’t have long. I broke out. Barely.” She doesn’t even feel the slightest twinge of guilt for the lie. “They’re looking for me. If they find me -”

            “Okay,” Dean says instantly, probably able to imagine how that sentence might end. “What do you need?”

            “Meet me,” Anna says. “Two-two-five Industrial. And please, just hurry.” With a bit of power, she brings Dean back to the waking world and leaves.

            Very soon after she touches down at the address that she had given Dean, an abandoned warehouse, because the Winchesters seem to like those, she hears the tell-tale sounds of an angel’s arrival.

            Cursing to herself, she calls out, “Hello? Who’s there?”

            A light bulb blows out, confirming her suspicions, and Anna turns around to see Castiel coming towards her.

            “Hello, Anna,” he says, and Anna just smiles humorlessly, because of fucking course.

            “Well,” Anna says, staring him down as best as she can. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the Winchesters don’t trust me.”

            “They do,” Castiel says. “I don’t. I wouldn’t let them come.” Anna doesn’t miss the implication. _They just trust me more than they trust you_.

            “And why is that?” Anna says. She hasn’t taken her eyes off Castiel once, which is becoming difficult, because he’s taken to prowling around her like some sort of big cat, posture wary. The reason why he is doing this is obvious; she can tell just by looking that he hasn’t been left unscathed by his disobedience. Without actually catching him, there’s only so much Heaven can do in the way of punishing him, but they can cut off his connection and drain off his power.

            He looks…diminished, less the unflappable creature he was before, and certainly lacking the coldness he’d had the night he’d turned her in.

            “If you’re out of prison, it’s because they let you out,” Castiel says, proving that his brain has not been affected by being cut off. “And they sent you here to do their dirty work.”

            “And what makes you so sure?” Anna asks.

            “Because I’ve experienced…” Castiel pauses, a minute shudder going through his entire body. “…Heaven’s persuasion.”

            “You mean when you gave me to them,” Anna snaps.

            “That was a mistake,” Castiel says. It’s not an apology, nothing close to an apology, and Anna doesn’t think she’d forgive him even if it were. She wishes she’d never gotten her memories or her Grace back, wishes she were still living as a human. The memories of that time are fuzzy, nebulous, but they’re sweet, one of the only good things she has going for her right now.

            “Anna, whatever they sent you here to do -” Castiel begins.

            Anna cuts him off. “They didn’t send me. I escaped.”

            “No one escapes,” Castiel says, wry little tilt in the corner of his mouth that says, _I tried_.

            “All these centuries, and you’re underestimating me now?” Anna asks. It’s a low blow, she knows, bringing up memories of the time when they’d served in the garrison together, but she can’t say she feels particularly badly about it.

            “If you’re not one of them, then what do you want?” Castiel asks. He still hasn’t relaxed in the slightest, and Anna can tell that words are going to have no effect on him now.

            She tries anyway. “I want to help.”

            “You want to help,” Castiel parrots, frowning.

            “Yes.”

            “Then what are you doing with that knife?” Castiel asks, and Anna curses to herself, but drops the façade. She draws the knife, a long, wicked-looking thing that will have no effect on Castiel.

            She smiles. “I’m not allowed to defend myself?”

            Castiel frowns, drawing out his own blade. It worries Anna a little, seeing the thing out in the open like that, but she’s confident in her ability to defeat him in battle, diminished as he is. Hell, she thinks that if it weren’t expressly against her orders, she may have killed him already. “Against whom?” he asks. “That blade doesn’t work against angels. It’s not like this one.” As if she doesn’t know what can and cannot kill an angel. “Maybe you’re not working for Heaven, but there’s something you’re not telling me.”

            Screw it. It’s not like he can stop her anyway. “Sam Winchester has to die.”

            She expects Castiel’s horrified look at that, and even sympathizes with him a little bit. After all, Sam had been nothing but nice to her for the short time they’d known each other. But the fact remains that he is an abomination, and he let Lucifer out of Hell, not to mention…

            “I’m sorry, but we have no choice,” she says. “He’s Lucifer’s vessel.”

            “He’s not the only one,” Castiel argues, and Anna scoffs.

            “What, that guy Nick? He’s burning away as we speak.” Dimly, Anna recognizes that she once would have cared about that, once would have felt sorry for the man doomed to have pure evil ride around inside him until his body disintegrates. She doesn’t anymore; she has bigger things to worry about. “No. Sam is the only vessel that matters. You know what that means? If Lucifer can’t take Sam, his whole plan short-circuits. No fight with Michael, no Croatoan virus, the Horsemen go back to their day jobs.”

            Really, it’s the logical thing to do, even when Anna had been reluctant when Zachariah had first mentioned it to her in Heaven, in one of the small windows of time between re-education sessions.

            “Think about it, Annael,” he’d crooned into her ear. “Those assholes might have already screwed the pooch on the whole popping Lucifer out of Hell deal, but imagine if Lucifer can’t get into his true vessel. Imagine if the prize fight never happens.”

            “We don’t have to kill him to do that,” Anna had gasped, struggling slightly against her bonds and flashing back to Sam in that warehouse in Sioux Falls, trying his best to help her and Ruby and everyone else, the way a rare smile had stolen over his face at one of Dean’s more acerbic comments. “He won’t say yes to Lucifer.”

            Zachariah had laughed, that short little disbelieving exhalation that he was so good at. “Really,” he’d said. “You think that the kid who spent the last year and a half sucking down demon blood and screwing the bitch who provided it wouldn’t say yes to Lucifer? Please. Sam Winchester’s weak, if not flat-out evil, and you know it.”

            He hadn’t been much interested in talking after that, and Anna lost count of how many more re-education sessions it had taken her to give in, but give in she had.

            “Even if you could kill Sam,” Castiel argues, bringing Anna back to the present. “Satan would just bring him back to life.”

            “Not after I scatter his cells across the universe,” Anna says. “They’ll never find him. Not all of him.”

            “We’ll find another way,” Castiel says softly, but he sounds unsure, and, like she had once before, Anna leaps on that scrap of insecurity like a predator on its prey.

            “How’s that going?” she asks. “How’s the Colt working out? Or the search for God? Is anything working? If you want to stop the devil, this is how.”

            The Castiel she’d known, even just a few months ago, would almost certainly have been swayed by her arguments. She’d been able to convince him to disobey, after all, and that was completely contrary to his nature.

            Instead of convincing him, though, it seems as though her arguments have only caused him to stand more firmly. “The answer’s still no,” he says, head held high and eyes boring directly into hers. “Because Sam is my friend.”

            Angels don’t have friends, but Anna supposes that Castiel is not quite an angel, not any more. “You’ve changed,” she says.

            “Maybe too late, but I have,” Castiel says, and he does not sound like he regrets it in the slightest, even with his power on the brink of deserting him entirely. “Anna, we have been through much together, but you come near Sam Winchester and I’ll kill you.”

            Anna does not doubt that he will, or die trying. It’s time for a different approach, then – she needs to go somewhere that Castiel cannot find her, cannot follow her. She does not have to think long before she comes up with the answer. It’s staring her right in the face.

            If you cannot kill a person directly, make sure they are never born.

***

            Even for a fully powered archangel, time travel is tough, and it takes Anna much longer than she would like to adjust to landing in 1979. Though her head aches and her stomach is churning, she nevertheless gets up as soon as she can, making a beeline straight for the house where Mary and John Winchester are living.

            It seems that she has underestimated the drive of a little seraph who has just recently allowed himself to feel, because when she gets there, she peers through the window to find Sam and Dean in the room, locked in what looks like a severely awkward conversation with the younger versions of their parents.

            Damn. Anna doesn’t see Castiel lurking around with them, but she can’t be too careful, and besides, the Winchesters have proven more than once that they are more clever and wily than they look. She doesn’t doubt their ability to find a way to stop her even without angelic assistance.

            Subtlety’s the way to go, then. It only takes a little expenditure of power to make the house’s phone ring, to talk to John Winchester in the voice of his boss, to get him to come into work, away from the rest.

            Of course, when she actually gets to John’s workplace, his boss is still there. Anna has a mission, though, Anna cannot waste time worrying about the well-being of random humans. The man starts to panic, as it looks to him like Anna’s appeared out of nowhere, and Anna kills him without a second thought, moving to lie in wait for John.

            John shows up after a few minutes, calling out “Mr. Woodson? You still here?” he sounds worried, and Anna has a difficult time connecting this man with the figure of John Winchester that she knew of from Heaven’s tales, the rough-and-ready hunter who had killed hundreds of supernatural creatures, the man who had sold his soul to Hell to save his son’s life, setting what would become a dangerous precedent.

            This man is none of that – he is slim, clean-shaven, little more than a child himself. If Anna does her job correctly, here, today, he will never have a chance to grow up into that man.

            Sam Winchester will never be born, Lucifer’s cage will never be opened, and the world will be saved.

            Anna doesn’t think about what it means that she’s chosen a time where Mary is already pregnant with Dean, and then decided to kill John instead of Mary. She simply steps out from her hiding place, behind where John has discovered the body of his boss, and grabs him when he turns around to face her, flinging him across the room in one easy motion.

            The sickness from the time travel hasn’t quite left her, though. She’s having trouble seeing clearly, and her reaction times are slow, slow enough that John has time to recover and hit her over the head with a crowbar. Anna tosses him across the room again, and then whirls around, because she’s heard footsteps behind her.

            Standing there, hatred in his eyes, is Dean, holding an angel blade that can only be Castiel’s. Anna doesn’t know if it’s a result of her feeling so ill or if it’s just hysterics, but she can’t help but wonder if Dean knows the implication of Castiel allowing him to handle his sword.

            It’s…suggestive, at the very least, and not just in the way that humans would understand.

            Of course, Anna thinks as she grabs onto Dean’s right wrist and his neck, it’s possible that Dean’s taken the sword without Castiel’s permission, but if that’s the case then he’s in worse shape than she thought.

            “I wish I could say it’s good to see you, Anna,” Dean rasps around Anna’s hand.

            “You too, Dean,” Anna says, and throws him as far as she can in the general direction of a window, smirking when she hears the sound of shattering glass. The sickness is making her fighting sloppy, and she’s starting to worry, starting to wonder if she should maybe have waited a bit longer for her attack, planned this a little bit better.

            Her situation only gets worse when Mary Winchester, a little blonde slip of a girl who looks like the conventional image of an all-American beauty queen, picks up the sword that Dean had dropped and twirls it around like someone who knows how to handle a weapon.

            Wonderful. Three hunters on her tail. Anna is only grateful that John has apparently not gotten into the family business quite yet, as his wife is still very much alive and currently trying to kill Anna.

            Anna has to use all her wits and tricks to dodge Mary’s blade – she ducks, dodges, and even goes so far as to go invisible for a few seconds, popping up behind Mary and grabbing her before she can whirl around again.

            “I’m sorry,” Anna says, taking a moment to feel something for this defiant woman and the fetus that will never be born. She throws Mary, like she’d done to her husband and son, and Mary slams back-first into one of the many cars that line the room, hard enough to crack the windshield.

            Displaying much more agility and fortitude than Anna expected, or than she should be capable of in her current state, Mary climbs off of the car, quickly going over to the crowbar that her husband had used on Anna earlier. Anna, who had been advancing on Mary, falters a little when she sees the weapon, which gives Mary just enough time to drive it directly into her chest.

            It hurts, quite a lot, but Anna has experienced much worse recently, so she merely pulls it out of her chest with a wince and drops it to the floor. “Sorry,” she says, ignoring Mary’s shocked face. “It’s not that easy to kill an angel.”

            Anna had been wondering, somewhere in the part of her mind that wasn’t preoccupied with her mission and her illness, where exactly Sam was in all this.

            It becomes obvious now, when she hears Sam’s voice say, “No.” Her eyes immediately snap over to the other side of the room, where Sam is standing next to a very familiar sigil.

            “But you can distract them,” Sam finishes, and presses his bloody palm onto the sigil before Anna can take a single step towards him.

***

            When Anna finally manages to get back into her vessel – a tedious process, especially given that she isn’t at her fullest capacity at the moment – she decides that she needs help. She, admittedly, hadn’t done a lot of research before jumping back to the 70s, and she was completely unprepared to handle a Mary Winchester who was a hunter, much less her sons.

            This time period will put her before her Fall, but only just – she knows for a fact that she’d begun pulling away years before she’d actually made the decision, pushing the rest of the angels away and keeping entirely to herself.

            There is one angel that she can count on, though, even if the thought of him makes her feel a little ill.

            He shows up with that barely perceptible flap of wings, and Anna breathes out, “Uriel,” almost involuntarily, before turning around.

            His vessel is younger, slimmer, but the being inside is almost exactly like the one she remembers, albeit just a bit less twisted and bitter than he’d been when she’d shoved her blade into him and watched the light explode out of his eyes.

            She wishes she hadn’t killed him. Right or wrong, good or evil, the fact remains that he’s her brother, and she misses him fiercely. It’s probably the lack of trust in the Winchesters, the lack of respect for the Winchesters, that’s leading her to feel this way, but she doesn’t much care.

            “You look well,” is the next thing Anna says, even though he really doesn’t. He looks sour, face pinched in discomfort, and Anna remembers how much he’d always hated taking a vessel, hated cramming his entire being into such a limiting little sHell.

            “You shouldn’t have called,” Uriel says. “We’re under strict orders not to come down here, much less take a vessel.”

            Anna resists the urge to roll her eyes. As if he’s reading her mind, Uriel continues, eyes narrowed with suspicion. “You’re not the Annael of now.”

            “No,” Anna says. “But thirty years from now, I’m still your superior.” It’s not, strictly speaking, true, but it is a veiled threat, as well as a reference to Sodom and Gomorrah, so Uriel begins to look a little more forthcoming, if mutinous. “I need you to kill some humans,” is what Anna says next, and that wipes any trace of discontent off Uriel’s face.

            “Always happy to do some smiting,” Uriel says, apparently not questioning the fact that the Anna he knows would never give an order like that. Perhaps he assumes, rightly, that the thirty years between them, inconsequential as they are on a celestial scale, changed her mind. “But what’s going on?”

            “In the future, these people are going to kill you, Uriel. I’m giving you a chance to kill them first,” Anna says.

            It’s not until that very moment that she realizes the implication of this. If Sam Winchester is never born, then Dean Winchester will never sell his soul. If Dean Winchester never sells his soul, then Castiel will never pull him out of Hell, and Castiel and Uriel will never be assigned to watch over him. And if Castiel and Uriel are never assigned to watch over Sam and Dean…

            Then Anna will never have any reason to kill Uriel.

            Ordinarily, that possibility would have occurred to Anna almost instantly. She blames the intensity of her focus on the mission and the lingering disorientation from the time travel on her inability to connect the dots until just now.

            “Thank you,” Uriel says, giving Anna the sort of look she hadn’t seen from him since before she Fell.

            _No, thank you_ , Anna thinks, as the two of them go to search for their prey.

            Sam and Dean are still hidden from her view, of course, but she’d managed to get a pretty good read on John and Mary, and it doesn’t take more than a few moments to locate them. They’ve holed up in Mary’s old family home, the one that’s still in her name but has sat abandoned since the deaths of her parents, and Anna thinks that it’s at least a welcome change from the usual dark warehouse.

            When they touch down outside, Uriel makes to go right in, but Anna’s hand shoots out and grasps his wrist. “Wait,” she says. “They know I’m coming, they’ll have prepared.”

            Uriel gives her a strange look. He’s been quiet, until now, not asking questions about the future or how she came to be in the past, but the idea must be so strange to him, humans knowing how to kill or even encumber angels. Still, he takes her at face value, nodding his assent as she creeps, invisible, into the house.

            It takes nearly all the power she has remaining, but she systematically takes care of the precautions that Sam and Dean had created, the sigils on the walls, the circles of holy oil. In the other room, she can hear the cadence of voices, Sam and Dean’s low tones mixed in with Mary’s higher ones. Mary sounds angry, disbelieving, and somehow Anna knows that they’re telling Mary the truth, telling her that they are her sons from the future, coming back to save her from an avenging angel at the cost of the entire world. She strongly suspects that they’re not telling her about the part where they (Sam) freed Lucifer from Hell, and she mentally scoffs at the sentiment that implies.

            Job done, Anna goes back outside to Uriel, landing rather more inexpertly than she is accustomed to.

            Uriel glances her over. “Perhaps it would be prudent if I entered first,” he says in his vessel’s honey-slow voice. “Took advantage of the element of surprise.”

            Anna appreciates his tact in not mentioning her failing power reserves, and nods her assent. She waits a few moments, watching the lights inside the little cabin all explode and plunge it into darkness, before entering, silently going to stand vigil at the exit opposite where Uriel is standing.

            Sam and Dean are obviously quite displeased to see Uriel, but are even more dismayed when they turn around to see Anna. Without skipping a beat, Sam lumbers towards her, face set in grim determination. Part of Anna would still like to think that it is Sam going after her because Dean cannot bear the idea of hurting her, but the majority of her dismisses this idea as foolishness. Dean’s dislike for Uriel is strong, and after the events of this evening, his dislike for Anna will surely be on the same level.

            As Anna tosses Sam, then John aside like they weigh nothing, she thinks of an expression she used to know when she was human. _Burning bridges_ , it was, the idea that there were things people could do to completely destroy any good feelings another person had for them. If this, going back in time in order to kill his mother, that woman that represents all that is light and goodness in his mind, will not burn Anna’s bridges with Dean, then surely what she’s about to do will.

            Sam has gotten up, recovering from Anna’s blows in that annoying way he has, and he is going after a knife that his father had dropped on the floor. It won’t even really hurt Anna, of course, but she is tired of this, wants it to stop.

            In one smooth motion, Anna pulls a light fixture off the wall and turns sharply, plunging it into Sam’s chest.

            The shockwaves are immediate. Dean’ anguished shout of “Sammy!” comes almost at the same moment that Sam slumps to the floor, bleeding from the fatal wound.

            Though this is what Anna came back for, her goal, she still feels a slight twinge of pain. As she turns to Mary, who is staring at the body of the man who she’s just found out is her son, she finds that the last of her human impulses are welling up soundly inside her.

            “I’m really sorry,” she says, then summons the old righteous fury, the feeling that she’d had when she’d flown into battle beside Uriel and the rest of her garrison, ready to stop this once and for all, save the entire universe in the process.

            She is brought up short by a sudden angelic presence, stronger and brighter than Uriel’s. “Anna,” the voice of John Winchester says, but Anna can hear the voice of her brother inside the body, the slight confusion at her new name and the fact that she is so out of place, temporally speaking.

            This is all wrong, Anna thinks as she stares at Michael. She would think that he had come to help her, but she had been just about to complete her mission – why would he come now?

            The answer comes to her just as Michael draws level with her. She imagines Zachariah’s grinning face as he tortured her in Heaven, and realizes she’s been tricked, sent to be killed somewhere out of the way so that the other angels won’t know that the blood is on Zachariah’s hands.

            Instantly, a wave of regret passes through her, and though she could fight, could run, she stands perfectly still as Michael reaches John Winchester’s hand towards her shoulder.

            It makes contact, and Anna feels herself being undone from the inside out, the fire eating at her Grace before bursting out of her body.

            The last thing she sees is Dean’s face, hard as if it were etched out of stone, and the last thing she thinks is a wholly inadequate apology.

***

            Annael’s decision to Fall was not a sudden one, not a choice she made lightly. It was gradual, a disillusionment that went back to the time of Lucifer’s Fall, and had gotten deeper with each tragedy since, with the Crusades and Joan and the endless bitter conflicts both in Heaven and on earth.

            The only reason she put it off for so long, until what was called the mid nineteen-eighties in human time, after the events of the twentieth century, the genocides and the atom bomb and the way humans were cannibalizing the planet that God had made for them, after God himself had vanished without a trace, was because of Uriel.

            Well, Uriel and the vessels.

            She’d been watching them, the young boys that are supposed to engineer the Apocalypse, since their births. She had seen their mother be cruelly ripped away from them, seen their father become taciturn and alcohol-soaked, seen both of them, particularly Dean, be forced to grow up far before their time.

            It was horrible, and bleak, and she had cried about it more than once, but if she Fell, she’d never be able to see them grow up, never be able to see if they live up to their destiny or if they would turn out to be just two more beings chewed up and spit out by God’s plan.

            Annael didn’t quite know when she’d become so cynical. Uriel would be proud, she was sure, but she didn’t allow that side of herself to come out to anyone. Not her garrison, not the other archangels, not even Uriel. It was so far from what she used to be, so far from what she was supposed to be that she hid it away, pushing it down within herself as she projected the image of Annael, peace of God, to the others.

            In the end, there wasn’t anything truly remarkable about the day she decided to Fall. She was worn down, dejected, and suddenly the reasons she’d always given herself for staying where she was just didn’t hold the weight that they used to.

            She didn’t tell anyone what she was going to do, didn’t say goodbye; she was afraid that if she did, she’d lose her nerve, she’d let herself be convinced to stay. That was the one thing she couldn’t do. She couldn’t stay in Heaven, doing the same things day in and day out, allowing herself to become bitter and angry at everything she had once held dear.

            She knew that she should get away from all the other angels to do this, but Uriel, sweet Uriel, was relentless, stubborn, in this as in all things. Annael didn’t know if he could somehow sense what she was going to do, or if he merely wanted to be around her, but he would not leave her side, and as the discontent and pain within her grew unbearable, she knew that she wouldn’t get a chance to be alone.

            In the end, it was easy to Fall. She turned to Uriel, told him she was sorry, and held his gaze for a moment, hoping that he would understand. Then she reached into herself and found that essence, that piece of her that made her an angel.

            She pulled, one quick yank, and pain, the likes of which she had never before felt, exploded through her. She was screaming, probably, and she was vaguely aware that Heaven was rushing away from her, but all she could focus on was the all-encompassing pain, her essence remaking itself to compensate for the lack of Grace.

            As she fell, Annael (could she even call herself that? She wasn’t _of God_ , not anymore) recalled something she had once heard, about how humans who decided to take their own lives would often regret jumping just as it was too late.

            Below, in a small town, a young woman looked up to the sky and saw a bright light streaking by. Smiling gently to herself, she turned away, and took up the prayer that she said every night, asking God to bless her with a child.


	7. The Book of Michael

[34]

So Saint Michael,

regent of the planet Mercury,

 

is not absent

when we summon the other Angels,

 

another candle appears

on the high-altar,

 

it burns with a potent flame

but quivers

 

and quickens and darkens

and quickens again;

 

remember, it was Thoth

with a feather

 

who weighed the souls

of the dead.

***

            It is written, what will happen with Sam and Dean Winchester, in the words of a hundred prophets, planned by God since the beginning of time.

            Which is why Michael is rather surprised when he learns that Annael has apparently taken it upon herself to kill Mary Winchester, in an attempt to ensure that God’s plan will never come to pass.

            Though he will never admit it to anyone other than himself, Michael is no stranger to doubt. He knows how it can eat away at a being until the doctrine they’ve believed in since their birth seems wrong. Still, Michael cannot in good conscience allow Annael to carry out her plan.

            Michael is one of the strongest of the angels, and with merely a thought he finds himself touching down outside a quaint little ranch house, the ancestral home of the Campbell family of hunters. It’s immediately obvious that he’s come to the right place: even if he couldn’t sense his siblings, the yelling and general mayhem would alert him to the trouble.

            One of the walls of the house is nearly destroyed, and that is what Michael sets his sights on. When he draws near, he sees a young, handsome man on the ground, limbs bent at odd angles and eyes hazy with pain.

            Masking the light and sound of his true form just enough to avoid causing the young man any more pain, Michael communicates with him, asking to take over his body. With most other humans, Michael could appeal to the pain that he is sure to be feeling from his injuries. But Michael knows of this human, has known of this human since the beginning of time, and he knows there is only one thing that will work on John Winchester.

            “I can save your wife,” Michael says simply, and John nods his assent, screwing up his face in anticipation.

            Michael could make it hurt to take over a body, but John Winchester is needed, and in any case, Michael doesn’t feel any malice towards him. On the contrary, Michael has never had reason to feel anything less than admiration for him, for his dedication and willingness to sacrifice himself for those he loves.

            So, when Michael takes over John, he not only does his best to make it completely painless, but he also heals John’s injuries with barely a thought. Straightening up and not allowing himself to dwell on how strange it feels to be in a vessel for the first time in millennia, Michael strides through the ruined wall of the house, his eyes resting upon the Vessels for the first time.

            It is almost difficult to see them through the fighting, but Michael manages, locating Sam on the floor, dead, with a gaping wound in his chest. Dean is still standing, still fighting, but Michael can tell that he’s flagging, that his despair at seeing Sam die, yet again, is throwing him off.

            In Dean’s state, he has allowed Annael to get around him, and she is stalking towards the third human in the room, Mary Winchester, like she is a predator and Mary is her prey. Though Mary is hardly helpless, she’s no match for Annael at her most righteous, and Michael can see that Annael will succeed in her mission unless he intervenes.

            As Annael approaches Mary, who stands in a fighting stance with a knife in her hand, eyes wary and guarded, Michael steps forward as well, just in time to hear Annael say, “I’m really sorry.”

            “Anna,” Michael says, unable to reconcile this creature with his sister and therefore using the name she goes by in the human world.

            Annael turns around smoothly. “Michael,” she says, and if Michael hadn’t already known something was very wrong here, he would have found out the moment he looked in her eyes.

            Despite the fact that she knows what is at stake here, that she knows just how important it is that Dean and Sam Winchester be kept alive, there is no fear in her eyes when she looks at Michael. Somehow, she believes that she is doing the right thing, is performing Heaven’s will, and that is how Michael knows that it is past time for talking.

            He lays a hand on Annael’s shoulder, and the flames of his power consume her Grace in an instant. She doesn’t have time to back away, doesn’t have time to do anything more than scream as her life is extinguished.

            Mary Winchester doesn’t drop her defensive stance, seeming even more wary despite the fact that her main pursuer is dead. Michael allows her a moment to collect herself as he turns to the other angel in the room, who he hadn’t paid much attention to until this moment.

            It is unsurprising that Annael would have called upon Uriel to help her, but Uriel is, has always been, a self-serving coward, and the first words out of his lips are a denial of any knowledge of the situation.

            Michael doesn’t doubt that he has no idea what is going on, that he merely heard Annael’s call and obeyed, and that fact alone is what causes him to banish Uriel across the world with a snap of his fingers rather than kill him. He might accuse another angel of sentimentality in his position, but Michael’s judgment has always had an inclination towards mercy – even now for Uriel, who has been dead to Michael since the day he was demoted. He’s put down better angels than Uriel, both far in the past and only a few moments since, and he has no doubt that he would kill Uriel too, should he deserve it.

            Uriel taken care of, Michael turns his attention back to Mary. He vaguely recognizes that Dean has run over to Sam’s lifeless corpse, and marvels, not for the first time, at human stupidity. Dean must know that Michael is going to restore his brother, is going to set both of them back on their assigned paths, yet he persists in his senseless grief.

            It appears that Dean may have inherited this trait from his mother, because the first words out of her mouth are, “What did you do to John?”

            “John is fine,” Michael says, attempting to be reassuring.

            It appears that his attempts aren’t successful, though, because Mary appears equally as suspicious when she asks, “Who – what are you?”

            Michael does not have time to explain angels to a woman who will retain no memory of this event, so instead of answering, he merely presses a finger to her forehead and sends her off to sleep, cleanly deleting the events of the last twenty-four hours from her mind.

            He then turns to Dean, satisfied at a job well done, and says, “Well, I’d say this conversation is long overdue, wouldn’t you?”

            Dean’s only response is to glare and jab a finger at his brother’s body. “Fix him,” he orders.

            Humans and their one-track minds, while useful on occasion, are supremely annoying. Were it not for his angelic patience, Michael is not sure he could bear it. As it is, he merely adds a condition to Dean’s request. “First, we talk,” he says. “Then I fix your darling little Sammy.”

            Dean still looks nothing short of mutinous, but it appears that he might have remembered with whom he is dealing, because he changes the subject. “How’d you get in my dad, anyway?”

            “I told him I could save his wife, and he said yes.”

            Dean snorts. “I guess they oversold me being your one and only vessel.”

            Typical. Michael absently wonders exactly what his inferiors have been telling Dean, but merely says, “You’re my true vessel, but not my only one.”

            “What is that supposed to mean?” Dean asks.

            “It’s a bloodline,” Michael explains, and he sees Dean’s brain begin to work, to mull the idea over. Still, he doesn’t seem to get it, and repeats the word back at Michael, who is starting to get tired of this.

            “Stretching back to Cain and Abel,” Michael elaborates. “It’s in your blood, your father’s blood, your family’s blood.”

            “Awesome,” Dean says sardonically. “Six degrees of Heaven Bacon. What do you want from me?”

            Michael knows that Dean has been belligerent from the beginning of his dealings with the angels, but he also knows that Dean is far from stupid. “You really don’t know the answer to that?”

            “Well, you know I ain’t gonna say yes,” Dean points out, unflinching as he stares into Michael’s borrowed eyes. “So why are you here? What do you want with me?”

            “I just want you to understand what you and I have to do,” Michael says. In the mouth of any other being, the words might sound pleading, but for Michael they are a mere statement of fact. He knows Dean will say yes, eventually, and appealing to Dean’s logic will only help the cause.

            The fact that Sam is lying dead at his feet, corpse growing colder by the second, is an extra incentive that Michael couldn’t have expected. He tries not to look at it for too long, avoiding the sightless eyes – not because the body disturbs him, but because it is all too easy for him to look at Sam and see Lucifer.

            “Oh I get it,” Dean says flatly, even as Michael is thinking this. “You got beef with your brother. Well, get some therapy, pal. Don’t take it out on my planet!”

            “You’re wrong,” Michael says, ignoring the flash of pain he gets at the mention of Lucifer, even so many, many years later. “Lucifer defied our father and he betrayed me. But still…I don’t want this any more than you would want to kill Sam.”

            Michael turns away from Dean, unable to look him in the face. He’s being more honest than he has been to anyone, even himself, in years. He supposes that coming face to face with a mirror image of yourself will do that.

            “You know,” Michael says, just slightly more softly than before. “My brother, I practically raised him. I took care of him in a way most people could never understand, and I still love him.”

            As he speaks, images of the time before the Fall run through Michael’s mind, the time when everything was simple, and his two great loves, God and Lucifer, weren’t at odds with each other.

            Still, despite their innate truth, despite the emotions they drag up from within him, they are calculated. Michael has had a long time to learn how to compartmentalize feelings, to lock grief inside and not let it cloud his judgment or sense of duty. He knows that telling Dean these few little details will remind him of his own relationship with Sam, which, loath as Michael is to admit it, is pure in a way that his and Lucifer’s never was. This fact will make it that much harder to convince Dean to let Sam go, but Michael has to try. He hardens his resolve and turns back to Dean. “But I am going to kill him, because it is right and I have to.”

            Dean scoffs. “Oh, because God says so?”

            “Yes,” Michael says simply. “From the beginning, he knew this was how it was going to end.”

            “And you’re just gonna do whatever God says.”

            It’s not a question, the way Dean phrases it, but Michael chooses to answer it anyway. “Yes. Because I am a good son.”

            Michael had almost forgotten that he was in John Winchester’s body, but the look on Dean’s face reminds him.

            “Okay, well trust me, pal,” Dean says, eyes boring into Michael’s borrowed ones. “Take it from someone who knows – that is a dead-end street.”

            “And you think you know better than my father?” Michael asks. “One unimportant little man. What makes you think you get to choose?”

            “Because I’ve got to believe that I can choose what I do with my unimportant little life,” Dean fires back.

            “You’re wrong.” Michael says flatly. “You know how I know?”

            He turns away from Dean and walks a few feet, gathering his thoughts. He must be precise, logical, if he wants to succeed here. “Think of a million random acts of chance,” he begins. “That let John and Mary be born, to meet, to fall in love, to have the two of you.” Michael indicates Sam’s corpse. “Think of the million random choices that you make, and yet how each and every one of them brings you closer to your destiny. Do you know why that is?” He doesn’t pause to let Dean interject, because he’s back in his comfort zone, the momentary loss of control caused by Dean’s insight gone. He is an instrument of God once more, and even if he does not get Dean’s assent here, now, he has no doubt that he will manage it in the future.

            “Because it’s not random. It’s not chance. It’s a plan that’s playing itself out perfectly. Free will is an illusion, Dean. That’s why you’re going to say yes.”

            Dean is quiet, but Michael can see his hands clenched into fists at his side. He is still refusing to accept it, but that is no matter; God created everything, after all, and that includes Dean. He would not make one of the most important instruments of His will impossible to convince.

            “Oh, buck up,” Michael says. “It could be worse. You know, unlike my brothers, I won’t leave you a drooling mess when I’m done wearing you.”

            Dean is silent for a moment, still obviously angry. “Well, what about my dad?” he finally asks. It’s not a yes, but it’s also not a no, nor a staunch defense of free will. Michael will take it as progress.

            “Better than new,” Michael promises. “In fact, I’m gonna do your mom and dad a favor.”

            “What?” Dean is instantly on the defensive again, and Michael makes a mental note to reprimand Zachariah for whatever he did that made Dean so hostile to the idea of angels doing him favors.

            “Scrub their minds,” Michael says. “They won’t remember me or you.”

            Dean gets, if anything, angrier. “You can’t do that,” he says, a note of desperation in his voice.

            “I’m just giving your mother what she wants,” Michael argues. “She can go back to her husband, her family –”

            Dean doesn’t appear to see it Michael’s way. “She’s gonna walk right into that nursery!”

            Michael doesn’t see his point. “Obviously.” Mary Winchester is going to die on the ceiling of Sam’s nursery on November 2nd, no matter what Michael does, and taking away her awareness of the fact will only make her last few years easier. He is offering a kindness, here, offering to clean up the mess that Annael has made. “And you always knew that was going to play out one way or another.”

            Michael makes one last attempt to speak Dean’s language. “You can’t fight City Hall,” he says softly, and when Dean doesn’t soften, he goes over to Sam’s corpse and presses his fingers to that giant forehead, effortlessly restoring Sam’s life and sending him back to his own time.

            “He’s home, safe and sound,” Michael says, turning back to Dean. “Your turn. I’ll see you soon, Dean.”

            After he restores Dean to his brother, Michael just stands where he is for a moment, looking around the ruined house. So much destruction, so much pain, could be avoided if Dean and Sam would just say yes, would just allow the battle to take place and be over. Still, what has happened here today is at least partially Michael’s fault, for not keeping a close enough eye on his subordinates. Things have to change.

***

            Michael was rarely aware of what went on down on Earth. His domain was Heaven, and he spent all of his time preparing himself to be God’s second-in-command.

            It hadn’t always been like that, of course; there was a time when the mere idea that God would need another being to help him control Heaven would have been unthinkable. After Lucifer, though, God had gotten distant, sad, as though he were regretting something, as though he had made a mistake.

            The idea was preposterous to Michael. God created everything, was the ruler of everything so, by default, everything he did was right. Still, Michael didn’t dare express his concerns, to God or to anyone else. It wouldn’t do to appear to contradict his orders.

            The remaining members of the Seven didn’t really even seem to notice the change in God, but then, the majority of them had never actually had face-to-face contact with him. That was a privilege reserved for Michael and Gabriel and Raphael.

            And once, Lucifer.

            This was the status quo for thousands of years, throughout the ages of human expansion. Empires rose and fell: Rome, Babylon, the Greek city-states, Egypt. Enormous structures were built and destroyed, and the humans invented things, trying their best to elevate themselves above their position. Michael couldn’t help but admire their drive, futile as it was.

            It was around what humans called the turn of the twentieth century, in the middle of the largest technological boom in history, that God disappeared.

            Michael knew that he shouldn’t expect God to explain himself; God was all-knowing, all-powerful, and did not owe anything to his lowly creations. Still, even after preparing for thousands of years for just such an eventuality, Michael could not have anticipated the amount of work it would take for him to run Heaven in God’s absence.

            Though more powerful than the majority of his brothers, Michael was not omniscient, and he could not keep an eye on every portion of Heaven at once, never mind Earth. He’d like to share the responsibilities among the Seven – he had a strong suspicion that God created them for this very purpose – but they were decimated, scattered to the corners of the Earth and Heavens, and there were only two left that Michael felt he could depend on: Zadkiel and Raphael. True, Uriel and Annael still occupied Heaven, but Uriel was untrustworthy and Annael grew more distant by the day.

            It wasn’t the most ideal situation. In fact, Micheal would have preferred it to be any other member of the Seven. Annael’s righteousness, Uriel’s ruthlessness, Azrael’s cool intelligence, Gabriel’s likability – any of those traits would have been more useful than anything Zadkiel or Raphael could provide.

            Michael was desperate, trying to keep Heaven from going the way of the Earth below it. As the turbulent twentieth century unfolded below, with first one world war, then another, revolts and rebellions and Imperialist cruelty, Depressions and race riots, Michael began to depend on some of his lower brothers.

            They weren’t capable of leading, of course, but they were brutes, enforcers, and, if not loyal enough to follow Michael because it was the right thing to do, they were at least afraid enough of the possibility of his wrath to fall into line.

            Zachariah was the most high-profile of these brothers, the one who seemed the least afraid of Michael and the one who was most likely to tell him that he was doing a good job. He was not particularly intelligent, competent, or pleasant, but he was what Michael had.

            It was that mindset that would eventually be Michael’s undoing.

***

            Michael gets the first mutterings of Dean’s acquiescence several weeks later. Though he does not wish it to, the development surprises him – he has been working more on making sure his subordinate angels are in line than on convincing Dean to say yes, and he cannot imagine what could have changed Dean’s mind.

            Still, Michael is not above seizing opportunities when they are given to him, and so he somewhat reluctantly reinstates Zachariah, the only angel still under his control who has had extensive dealings with the Winchesters, and goes to assess the situation.

            When he drops down to Earth, Dean is driving around in that car that he loves so much, alone, with a serious expression on his face. Michael wants desperately to appear to Dean, to obtain his yes so that he can begin to put his plans in motion, but he senses that nudging Dean would only lead him to regress into his former stubbornness.

            Instead, Michael settles, unseen, into the empty passenger seat of the Impala. The radio is not on, and the only sound that Michael can hear is the steady purring of the engine beneath him, as well as the occasional rustle of clothing when Dean changes positions. Every once in a while, Dean will look over towards the passenger seat as though he is expecting to see someone sitting there, and it is only Michael’s absolute confidence in his own powers that keeps him from worrying that Dean can see them.

            Dean is visibly tense, and quick to anger, biting out curse words and making rude gestures whenever another driver does something to irritate him. Though Michael is certain of Dean’s intention to say yes – there would be no other reason for him to drive off without Sam or Castiel – he is less certain about what the purpose of this road trip is. Dean is already miles away from Sam, and inviting Michael in to his body would take less than a second.

            Michael only gets his answer several hours later when Dean pulls up to a nondescript house. Though angels do not sleep, Michael has allowed the rumble of the car and the monotony of the road to lull him into a state of inertia.  

            When the engine cuts off, Michael finds himself instantly jolted into a state of awareness. He doesn’t recognize his surroundings, but he assumes that Dean has some important business to take care of, some emotional human connection that he needs to attend to before he allows Michael to take him over.

            Instead of exiting the car immediately, as Michael expects, Dean doesn’t move for a long moment, his white-knuckled hands gripping the steering wheel and his head turned to examine the house. Just as Michael begins to be truly concerned, Dean takes a deep breath and gets out of the car, striding quickly up the sidewalk towards the front door of the house.

            Confused, Michael decides to follow him. It’s not, strictly speaking, part of his mission, but Michael cannot help being fascinated by Dean, this man who is, supposedly, his mirror in all things.

            Dean makes his way to the door, and knocks firmly, the hesitation he had displayed in the car covered by a layer of bravado. After a few seconds of waiting, in which Dean shoves his hands into his pockets and rocks back and forth on the balls of his feet, the door swings open, and a beautiful woman pokes her head out. Her brows furrow in confusion when she sees Dean, but her voice is bright enough when she greets him.

            She looks familiar to Michael, and she is obviously an important figure in Dean’s life if he has chosen to visit her at this time, but it’s not until Dean replies, rubbing at his head sheepishly and calling the woman by name, that Michael is able to place her.

            Lisa Braeden. Yoga instructor, old flame, and mother to a child that a part of Dean still thinks could be his. Michael is slightly surprised that Dean has chosen to see her, because as far as he knows, he hasn’t had contact with her in a few years. Still, he supposes that a looming apocalypse can cause people to rethink their priorities, to try and repair relationships that they have neglected.

            While Michael has been considering this, Dean and Lisa have been making their way through awkward small talk. It appears that Lisa is more perceptive than Michael might have imagined, though, because after Dean makes a comment about her new house, she says, “Dean, you didn’t come all the way here to talk about real estate. You alright?” Her dark eyes haven’t left Dean since she opened the door, but her arms are crossed over her chest in a defensive gesture. Michael doesn’t know the depths of her feelings for Dean, doesn’t even know the depths of Dean’s feelings for her, but he suddenly feels sorry for this woman, having a man she’d no doubt written out of her life entirely suddenly show up at her door, looking as wrecked as Dean does now.

            Still, this slight sympathy for her is as far as Michael goes. This apocalypse has to happen, no matter the feelings of any individual human, or even any individual angel. God has commanded it, and so it shall be.

            “No, not really,” Dean admits in response to Lisa’s question about his well-being.

            “Well, what is it?” Lisa asks, looking concerned and uncrossing her arms.

            Dean takes a deep breath. “Look. I have no illusions, okay? I know the life that I live, I know how that’s going to end for me. Whatever. I’m okay with that.” He pauses for a moment. “But I wanted you to know…that when I do picture myself happy…it’s with you. And the kid.”

            The look on Lisa’s face has been growing more and more concerned as Dean makes his speech. When she hears the confession at the end, though, there is a flash of pain across her face, and her expression shutters again. “Wow,” she says, voice flat.

            “I mean, you don’t have to say anything,” Dean says sheepishly, perhaps realizing that this was a bad idea.

            Lisa shakes her head. “No, I mean, I know. I know. I want to. Come inside. Let me give you a beer.” She steps aside, gesturing Dean inside, and Michael is suddenly filled with admiration for this woman. He is not extraordinarily well-versed in human emotion, human interaction, but he knows that the Winchesters are not an example of how to behave, prone to letting negative feelings build up inside of them until they cannot contain them anymore and then lashing out, getting into fights or else driving halfway across the country to intrude upon a woman they haven’t seen in years. Michael can easily see the parallel in himself, the way he has been swallowing his own opinions and feelings for millennia, wiping them away in favor of conforming exactly to God’s plan. For just a moment, Michael wishes that he could be more like Lisa than Dean, that he could display such calm acceptance and sympathy even in a painful situation.

            “I wish I could,” Dean says reluctantly. “Take care of yourself, Lisa.” He turns to go, but Lisa is clearly not a person who will take poor treatment lying down, and she call out after him.

            “No wait, wait!” she says, voice rising in both pitch and volume. “You can’t just drop a bombsHell like that and then leave.”

            “I know, I’m sorry,” Dean says. “But I don’t have a choice.”

            “Yeah, you do. You do. “ Lisa says firmly. “You can come inside and let me get you a beer. We can talk.”

            Michael finds himself wishing that Dean would take her offer, would go inside and unburden himself to someone who is more impartial than Sam or Bobby or Castiel, who would listen to his every word without judgment.

            He doesn’t, of course, because he’s Dean Winchester, the Righteous Man, with a martyr complex built into him since birth. What he does, though, is catch Lisa’s arm, and say, “Lisa, wait a minute. Things are about to get really bad.”

            “Like how?” Lisa asks. “Like your kind of bad?

            “Worse.” Dean says grimly. “Next few days, the crap you’re gonna see on your TV, it’s gonna be downright trippy. Scary. But I don’t want you to worry, because I’m making arrangements for you and Ben.”

            “Arrangements?” Lisa asks warily.

            “Whatever happens, you’re gonna be okay,” Dean says. He’s obviously trying for reassurance, but, judging by the look on Lisa’s face, barely contained concern bordering on panic, he’s not succeeding.

            “What do you mean? What are you talking about?” she asks sharply.

            “The people that I’m gonna see next, they’re not gonna get anything from me without agreeing to a few conditions,” Dean says. Michael might have known that Dean’s saying yes would come with strings attached, but he feels like Lisa and Ben’s protection, at least, is one thing he can guarantee. He’s just glad that Dean is planning to go straight to him, instead of through Zachariah, because Zachariah would probably kill Lisa and Ben out of pure spite.

            “Just…just come inside,” Lisa pleads. “And whatever you’re thinking of doing, don’t do it.” She sounds like she’s trying to dissuade someone who’s about to jump off a bridge. In a way, she is.

            “I have to.” Dean says.

            “Just stay an hour,” Lisa says, a tinge of desperation to her voice. “At least say bye to Ben.” It’s a dirty trick, bringing the child into it, but Michael can see what she’s trying to do.

            “It’s better if I don’t,” Dean says, and the amount of self-loathing that Michael can read into that simple statement is staggering. Regardless of how much these people love and care about him, it seems that Dean will always think they are better off without him, will always think that he makes their lives worse just by knowing them.

            Still, Dean is human, and it seems he cannot resist for long. He steps forward and draws Lisa into a kiss, more affectionate than sexual. When he pulls away just a few seconds later, Lisa’s face is resigned, as though he had somehow convinced her through his kiss in a way he couldn’t with words.

            “Bye, Lisa,” Dean says softly, and then he turns and walks back to the Impala. Lisa watches him go, silent.

***

            It’s not long after Dean gets to his motel for the night that Sam finds him. Even though the majority of Sam’s psychic powers died with Azazel, and the rest of them will lie dormant as long as he doesn’t drink demon blood, Michael thinks, just for a split second, that Sam must have used some sort of otherworldly power to find Dean.

            Dean appears to think the same thing, because his first reaction to Sam’s opening snarky comment is to ask “How’d you find me?”

            “You’re going to kill yourself, right?” Sam asks, his face hard. “It’s not too hard to figure out the stops on the Farewell Tour. How’s Lisa doing, anyways?”

            The strength of Sam and Dean’s relationship will never cease to amaze Michael. Over the past twelve hours, Michael has been watching Dean do anything and everything he can to avoid Sam and throw him off the scent, and yet here Sam is, looking enormously tall and very angry, but obviously having had little to no trouble predicting Dean’s every move.

            “I’m not going to kill myself,” Dean says warily. Even as he holds his hands up as though he’s trying to comfort a frightened animal, his body is shifting into a fighting stance.

            “No?” Sam says skeptically. He hasn’t shifted his body posture at all, standing with his arms crossed over his chest and his feet planted firmly on the floor. “So Michael’s _not_ about to make you his Muppet?”

            Michael resents that, just a bit, though he supposes that they don’t have any reason to think otherwise. He knows for a fact they’ve seen the state of Raphael’s vessel after he finished with it and the flesh rotting off of the poor soul that Lucifer is possessing, the wrong body unable to contain his raw power. Hell, they’ve even met Castiel’s vessel, heard his stories, and Castiel is probably the most careful with his vessel out of all the angels Michael knows.

            When Dean doesn’t answer his, admittedly hypothetical, question, Sam steps forward, bringing he and Dean within punching distance of each other. “What the hell, man?” he says, allowing hurt to creep into his voice along with the anger that has been there the whole time. “This is how it ends? You just…walk out?”

            “Yeah, I guess,” Dean says. He’s trying to act nonchalant, like none of this really affects him, but Michael can see right through him, and he’s quite positive that Sam can as well.

            “How could you do that?” Sam asks, sounding genuinely baffled. If Michael were in the habit of wincing, he would have done so, because he can see the opening that Sam has left for Dean here.

            Sure enough, Dean takes it, going on the offensive. “How could _I_?” He shoots back, incredulous. “All you’ve _ever_ done is run away.”

            Michael can see the exact moment the words hit Sam, the things about Stanford and Ruby that go unsaid causing more damage than the words Dean’s actually said. Still, he soldiers on, firm in his conviction that he’s right. “And I was wrong, every single time I did.”

            Dean doesn’t answer him, choosing instead to turn back to where he’s been packing some of his belongings away.

            Sam sighs. “Just…please,” he says, voice softer than before. “Not now. Bobby’s working on something.”

            Dean turns back to him. “Oh really? What?” He’s got a skeptical eyebrow raised, which is justified when Sam hesitates just a moment too long in answering. “You’ve got nothing, and you know it,” Dean says.

            Even though Michael knows that this is what has to happen, he doesn’t like the hollow tone in Dean’s voice, the mechanical way he avoids Sam’s eyes and goes back to packing up his things. Dean Winchester is supposed to be fiery and rebellious, is supposed to be dragged kicking and screaming into the Apocalypse the same way he was dragged kicking and screaming into Hell in the first place.

            Clearly, Michael has been spending too much time in the company of the humans. He really should reveal himself, because if there is anyone who can ruin Heaven’s plans now, it’s Sam, but he is afraid to upset the delicate balance of Dean’s acquiescence with his intervention.

            “You know I have to stop you,” Sam says, his voice low and regretful. Michael is struck by his resemblance to Lucifer, the edge of steel to his tone that he last heard right before the Fall.

            “Yeah, well, you can try,” Dean says dismissively. “Just remember, you’re not all hopped up on demon blood this time.”

            Dean seems determined to completely alienate Sam, at this point. Michael supposes he’s trying to make this whole thing easier on the both of them. He really should have learned by now that their relationship doesn’t work like that.

            “Yeah, I know,” Sam says, and Michael begins to feel a disturbance in the air around him, the kind he knows all too well. “But I brought help.”

            Michael has never been particularly close to Castiel. In fact, Michael had never really paid attention to Castiel, at least until he was set on the mission to pull the Righteous Man out of Hell. Even so, Michael knows that the look he sees on Castiel’s face right now, the pain, betrayal, and anger, is entirely out of character for him.

            Before Dean can even react, Castiel touches his fingers to his forehead, neatly knocking him out. Sam watches his brother crumple to the floor, then turns to Castiel. “Was that really necessary?” he asks, though he doesn’t sound entirely reproachful.

            “I’d like to do much more than that” Castiel replies, then whisks both the Winchester brothers away.

            Michael stays where he is for half a beat, reconsidering his plan. This, Dean’s escape, has been the closest he’s gotten in a full year, and he can’t imagine he’ll get a similar opportunity, not with Sam and Castiel watching Dean.

            No, it’s time to do something drastic. Michael needs to fight Lucifer, and for that, he needs Dean. There is no other option.

***

            In hindsight, Michael should have chosen Castiel to help him.

            He’d known, through God’s love of cryptic hints, that Castiel was important, that he had a special role in God’s plan, but Michael had never quite paid attention to him anyway. Castiel wasn’t a _presence_ , the way their other brothers were; he was forever relegated to the background of everything that was going on, silent and stoic, though eager.

            How was Michael supposed to know that this particular brother, this devout servant of God, would be the one who would defect to the human side and thwart Michael at every turn? How was Michael supposed to know that Castiel would choose the Winchesters over the entire host of Heaven, would cheerfully die for the cause?

            God knew, of course, because God knew everything, but that fact didn’t help Michael in the slightest.

***

            Zachariah is cruel, petty, and incompetent, but he is the angel that has had the most contact with the Winchesters, and so Michael reluctantly goes to him for help with his dilemma.

            Fresh off his recent firing and reinstatement, Zachariah’s tendency to suck up has been turned up to eleven. Michael wouldn’t have put up with it if he weren’t desperate, but his time is running out. If he doesn’t get Dean to say yes soon, then Lucifer will be unopposed, and the whole world will suffer for it.

            Amazingly, it’s Zachariah who comes up with the idea. “What about Adam?” he says, after the two of them have been talking strategy for hours and not getting anywhere.

            Michael frowns, wracking his brains for the slightly familiar name. “Adam Milligan?” he asks when he finally locates it. “John Winchester’s bastard son?”

            “Yes!” Zachariah says, perking up. “He’s part of the bloodline, he can contain you.”

            “He can,” Michael allows, mulling the idea over. Much as he hates giving Zachariah any credit, it does give him a failsafe, a way to fight Lucifer if Dean continues to be stubborn. Still… “That should be our last resort,” he says. “Dean is my true vessel, and I will be far more powerful in his body than in Adam Milligan’s.”

            Zachariah noticeably deflates, and the two of them are silent for a few moments. Michael is turning over the situation in his mind, the way that he has done for months now. He feels as though he knows Dean better than almost any other being in existence. He knows that Dean is loyal to his brother to a fault, yet that knowledge has not helped him to force Dean’s hand. He’s tried being nice, tried connecting, and nothing had worked.

            “Wait,” Zachariah says suddenly, and Michael turns to him, resigned to hear more stupidity. “What if you possess Adam -”

            “I already told you why that wouldn’t work,” Michael says.

            Zachariah barrels on, unheeding of Michael’s interruption, and it is that fact, more than anything else, that causes Michael to listen to what he had to say. Were this more bureaucratic nonsense, Zachariah would have stopped talki the second Michael started. “What if you possess Adam, and use him to get Dean to say yes?” Zachariah sounds more excited than Michael has ever heard him, the prospect of success after so many failures tantalizing. “You can’t possess Sam because he’s tainted with demon blood, but if you could, Dean would surely say yes just to spare him.”

            “And Adam is the next best thing,” Michael finishes the thought. Loath as he is to give Zachariah credit for anything, much less for the idea that may very well lead to Dean saying yes, he sees the logic. “It’s a good idea.”

             By Zachariah’s reaction to the words, one might think that he had just received a stay of execution. “Thank you,” he says, unpleasant voice made even more unpleasant by its newfound breathless quality.

            “Do you know where his Heaven is?” Michael asks, wanting to cut short Zachariah’s display of gratitude.

            “Of course,” Zachariah says.

            “Go speak to him,” Michael orders. “Tell him about our cause, be as convincing as you can. We will need him to be firmly on our side in case anything goes wrong.”

            Zachariah nods and takes off. Michael, after a second of consideration, follows him, easily slipping into invisibility. He no longer trusts Zachariah to do these things alone.

***

            Adam Milligan’s Heaven is fairly depressing. As a young man with an absent father and a mother who had to work long hours to keep food on the table and a roof over their heads, his short life hadn’t had too many happy moments.

            When Zachariah touches down, Michael following close behind, Adam is in the midst of one of the few memories that he has of his father.

            It’s a muggy day, but Adam, in that way that excited children have, didn’t seem to feel the heat. The man who claimed to be his father had shown up and, after a talk with his mother that Adam hadn’t been meant to hear but had eavesdropped on anyway, whisked him away. The two of them had spent all day together, driving around in John’s car. They had gotten lunch, seen a movie, and now they were standing in an open field. Adam had a brand new baseball glove on his hand, the smell of the new leather occasionally wafting up to him, and he and John were throwing a baseball back and forth. Earlier in the day, John had promised him that he’d come back for his birthday and take him to a real game, a major-league one.

            Adam, who’d only ever been able to see games on his tiny living-room television set, and even then only when his mother had made enough extra money that month for cable, had been beside himself with joy.

            (Of course, when his birthday that year had rolled around, John didn’t show, and twelve-year-old Adam had locked himself in his room and refused to come out, spurning the presents that his mother had undoubtedly scrimped and saved to buy for him. He’d felt badly about it later, when he understood more, but at the time, he’d only been able to feel, with the single-mindedness of a child, John’s betrayal.

            By the time John had finally made good on his promise, over two years after the fact, Adam hadn’t touched his baseball glove or watched a game in years.)

            It was always odd, seeing humans in the midst of their memories, because they always appeared to be the age at which they died, no matter how old they were when the memory was made. When Zachariah touched down in Adam’s Heaven, then, a twenty-year-old Adam was playing catch with John Winchester, whose face was blurry and diaphanous, the amount of time they had spent together in Adam’s lifetime clearly not enough to fix an image in his head.

            “Adam Milligan?” Zachariah asks, and Adam turns away from the game, the details of the memory fading around him, leaving only the Minnesota dusk, the gentle breeze and whine of cicadas, around them.

            “Yeah?” Adam says, sounding exasperated.

            “Do you know where you are?” Zachariah asks, clearly trying for some sort of tact. The effort really only makes him sound seedier than usual, but Michael can’t fault him for trying.

            “No, but wherever it is, it’s bullshit,” Adam snaps. “I keep cycling through the same, like, three days of my life over and over again!”

            Adam’s a Winchester, alright, down to the penchant for annoying Zachariah.

            “You’re in Heaven,” Zachariah explains. “And I’m an angel of the Lord.”

            Adam stares at him for a solid minute, and then snorts and turns away. “Really? You expect me to believe _that_?” he says. “Look, dude, I’m no Sunday-school kid, but even I know that Heaven is paradise, and this is not paradise.”

            He indicates his surroundings with disgust, and Michael has to admit that it doesn’t sound very pleasant, being forced to relive your own memories, over and over again.

            He’s fairly certain it would drive him mad.

            “Human religion has a…how shall I put it...unrealistic vision of Heaven,” Zachariah says smoothly, attempting to cover up his anger with smarminess. “Rest assured, you are in Heaven. Do you remember dying?”

            For the first time, Adam’s mask of indifference and combativeness slips, just a bit. “I don’t know,” he says. “There were these…” he shakes his head, mask slipping back into place. “You’re crazy,” he decides, turning away from Zachariah entirely.

            Zachariah gives a put-upon sigh and flies around so he was back in Adam’s line of sight. Though Michael can see every movement, it must seem impossibly fast to Adam.

            “Look, kid,” Zachariah says flatly, ignoring Adam’s stifled shout of surprise. “I don’t have time to mess around here. You’re in Heaven, I’m an angel, and we need your help.” As he speaks, he allows his wings to become visible, slipping into that shadowy state that helps humans recognize them.

            Adam no longer looks like the petulant young man of a few minutes before; instead, he looks nothing less than awed. Michael supposes that humans get that way when they see an angel for the first time, even a less-than-impressive specimen like Zachariah.

            “You need _my_ help?” Adam asks after a few seconds. “Why me?”

            “It’s a long story,” Zachariah demurs. He’d been very obviously growing angry, but he makes what looks to be a conscious effort to calm himself down again. “What do you know about Lucifer?”

            Adam raises one eyebrow. “Like I said, I was never a Sunday school kid. Lucifer’s just another name for Satan, right?”

            “More or less,” Zachariah allows. “Anyway, a couple of stupid chucklefucks down on Earth managed to let Lucifer out of his cage, and now he’s about to destroy life as we know it.”

            “How does someone just…let the devil out?” Adam asks.

            Zachariah snorts. “Trust me, kid, when you meet these two, you’ll understand. They’re not exactly the sharpest knives in the drawer, if you get my drift. Always running around, screwing with the fabric of the universe just for their own selfish interests.”

            “Sounds like you’ve got a bit of a personal stake in this,” Adam observes.

            “You have no idea. Anyway, there’s only one angel who can possibly stand a chance against Lucifer. His name’s Michael. Problem is, Michael needs a human body in order to walk around on Earth.”

            “So you want Michael to possess me, then,” Adam surmises, and Zachariah blinks, obviously surprised by how quickly Adam figured it out. Not for the first time, Michael wonders why he trusts Zachariah to speak to humans, when he’s demonstrated his tendency to underestimate them over and over again.

            “Basically, yeah,” Zachariah says.

            “But why me?” Adam asks. “There are, what, seven billion people on the Earth? People who you wouldn’t have to raise from the dead.”

            Zachariah makes a dismissive gesture. “Please. It’s not like it’ll be hard to raise you. Besides, it has to be you. Angels can only possess certain people, the members of a bloodline. You’re special, Adam.”

            “Flattery will get you everywhere,” Adam jokes. He’s started to relax, no longer as on guard as he was when Zachariah first appeared, and Michael feels a surge of hope. He doesn’t quite trust it, not yet, but the plan is going better than he’d imagined.

            “So you’ll do it?” Zachariah asks, eager.

            “One condition,” Adam says. “I want to see my mom again. If it’s so easy for you to raise me, then you can raise her too, right?” he suddenly looks much younger, like a child, and Michael spares a second to feel sorry for him, for his life that was cut short by a band of ghouls. The feeling passes quickly, though, and all Michael can feel is the anticipation curling in his gut.

            “Yeah, yeah, of course,” Zachariah says.

            Adam nods slowly. “Alright, then. I’ll do it. Send me back to Earth.”

            Michael has never understood the human impulse to perform gestures of triumph until this very moment. If he were less dignified and also in a vessel, he thinks he’d fist pump.

            “One thing first,” Zachariah says, his face turning serious. “There are some people you need to watch out for, some people who will try to stop you.”

            “Lemme guess,” Adam says. “The people who freed the devil?”

            “Yep. Their names are Sam and Dean Winchester.”

            “Winchester?” Adam asks.

            “Yes,” Zachariah says. “They’re your half-brothers. And they’ve been a pain in our collective rears for months now. If they find you, it’s important that you don’t listen to anything they say. They’re con men, criminals – they’ll say anything to get you to trust them, and then stick a knife in your back when you least expect it. Both metaphorically and literally.”

            Adam heaves a sigh and looks at the place where the blurry figure of John Winchester had been a few moments before. “Can’t say I’m surprised, if they’re related to him,” he mutters. His face clears and he looks back at Zachariah. “Alright, message received. Watch out for Sam and Dean Winchester.”

            “I mean it,” Zachariah says. “I can’t emphasize the seriousness of this enough. If you let them sway you, the devil will win, and humankind as you know it will cease to exist.”

            “Couldn’t you just, y’know, _not_ let them get to me?” Adam asks. “I mean, you guys are, like, all-powerful, right? Surely you can hide me from a couple of humans, even ones who have Satan on their side?”

            “It’s…not just Lucifer that they have,” Zachariah says, the look on his face suggesting that he’s just ingested something very unpleasant. “One of our number has defected, and besides that, they have a network of human and demon contacts to help them out. We are not omnipotent, Adam.”

            “Jeez, what are they, mob bosses?” Adam asks. “Fine, fine, I won’t let Sam and Dean Winchester corrupt me or whatever, let’s just do this.”

            “Adam…” Zachariah starts again, but Adam levels him with a serious look, and Zachariah, after studying him for a moment, snaps his fingers, effortlessly sending Adam’s soul back to his body.

            As soon as Adam is gone, Michael touches down next to Zachariah. “Shouldn’t we pull him out of that grave first?” he asks.

            “Nah, builds character,” Zachariah says dismissively.

            “This had better work, Zachariah,” Michael says, bristling at Zachariah’s irreverent tone. “You won’t get a third chance.”

            Zachariah seems to remember to whom he’s speaking. “Of course,” he acknowledges, voice going back to the oily register he uses when he’s trying to sound subordinate. “This will work.”

***

            It doesn’t work.

            Sam and Dean are one step ahead of them, as they always seem to be, and Castiel gets to Adam before Zachariah can, whisking him off into the distance and hiding him from their sight, presumably using the same cheap trick he has used on Sam and Dean before.

            Zachariah is furious, and, though he’s trying not to show it in front of Michael, he’s afraid as well. Luckily, they have one last resort left to them, one more way to convince Adam of their plan without having to know where he is.

            Adam’s dreams are almost indistinguishable from his memories. Michael doesn’t know if this indicates a lack of imagination on Adam’s part or simply an overabundance of trauma, but his dreams feature him sitting on a park bench next to a playground.

            “Your mom’s not coming, you know,” Zachariah says as he appears next to Adam. He’s wearing his vessel now, but Adam’s lack of reaction to seeing an old man appear next to him indicates that he was expecting them. “This is the park where your mom took you on her day off, right? She’s not coming. Not yet. But she will. Soon.”

            Adam doesn’t react to Zachariah’s words, choosing instead to ask “You’re Zachariah, right?”

            “I am,” Zachariah confirms. “You weren’t where you were supposed to be, kid.” He does a decent job of controlling the anger in his voice, a fact by which Michael is surprised.

            “Yeah, I know,” Adam says shortly, and Michael can feel his hope that this will work starting to slip away. Damn those Winchesters and their powers of persuasion, their puppy dog eyes and sob story.

             “Can’t quite zero in on you, either,” Zachariah says, which is an understatement. Castiel is much sneakier than Michael has ever given him credit for, and the sigils hide Adam from angelic view so completely that it was difficult for them to even find his dream. “So let me take a wild guess. You’re with Sam and Dean.”

            “Yeah,” Adam says, and just that one word is enough to express a myriad of emotions. Stupid. Michael should have recognized the effect that meeting siblings, even ones he was warned against, would have on Adam. After all, even though it’s been many millennia since the good times of the Seven, Michael remembers what it is like to have siblings.

            “Didn’t we tell you about them?” Zachariah asks, sounding as though he’s talking to a toddler. Michael is suddenly reminded of the way that his fellow angels would hint to him that something about his relationship with Lucifer was off, always in asides or half-truths. He hadn’t recognized them, not at the time.

            Adam’s only reaction to Zachariah is a slight nod. Even Michael, hovering unseen near them, is beginning to get frustrated with him.

             “So you know you can’t trust them, right?” Zachariah asks rhetorically. “You know Sam and Dean Winchester are psychotically, irrationally, erotically codependent on each other, right?”

            “I don’t know,” Adam says slowly, apparently not wanting to consider Zachariah’s implications of incest. “They said a few things about you.”

            Michael doesn’t doubt that they had. There are many things that can be said about Zachariah, very few of them positive.

            “Really? Trust me kid,” Zachariah says, leaning closer to Adam conspiratorially. “When the heat gets hot, they’re not gonna give a flying crap about you. Hell, they’d rather save each other’s sweet bacon than save the planet. They’re not your family. Understand?” Zachariah pauses, and Michael takes those few seconds to feel guilty that neither he nor Zachariah gives a ‘flying crap’ about Adam, either. Adam is nothing more than a tool, a means to an end.

            But then, aren’t they all, really?

            “Now, do you want to see your mom again or not?” Zachariah says, and Michael can see the exact moment when Adam makes his decision.

            “I’m at this house, I think it’s in North Dakota?” he says hesitantly. “It belongs to this guy in a wheelchair and trucker cap, they call him Bobby. There’s also some angel here, Cas? You might wanna watch out for him, he seems pretty powerful.”

            Zachariah raises his eyes to the spot where Michael is. Were Michael visible, they’d probably exchange exasperated looks. Michael doesn’t know if he’s more upset that they couldn’t figure out that Adam had been taken to the most obvious place in the world or at the implication that _Castiel_ , of all beings, might be too much for them to handle.

            “Bobby Singer’s house, Sioux Falls, South Dakota,” Zachariah says decisively. “We’ll come grab you in a few minutes, kid.” He presses two fingers to Adam’s forehead, sending him back to the land of the waking. As soon as he’s gone, Michael makes himself visible again.

            “Bobby Singer’s house,” he says, his speech clipped. He’s decided what he’s more angry about.

            “We didn’t think they’d take him to such an obvious place,” Zachariah argues, meaning _I_ when he says _we_. “It’s an easy mistake to make.”

            “Just go get him, Zachariah,” Michael says. “Take him to Van Nuys. And don’t mess this up again. You’re on very thin ice.”

***

            Michael has to admit that this plan is working better than he’d thought. Apparently, the mere threat of Adam saying yes to Michael is enough to send Sam and Dean into panic mode.

            He’d be lying if he didn’t also say that it was extremely satisfying to watch Castiel lose his faith in Dean so violently.

            The room in Van Nuys is set up similarly to the way it was when Dean was imprisoned there, a little less than a year ago. Michael hadn’t been there, then, too busy trying to run Heaven by himself. This time, he’ll be sure not to miss it, not to let this opportunity get away from him.

            There is apparently much to be said for the effects of shared genetics on a child, or maybe the enjoyment of burgers is universal to humans. In any case, Adam reacts much the same way that Dean had when he’d seen the burgers the year before: ignoring the beautiful art spread around him, he makes a beeline for the table and begins to eat.

            Zachariah materializes next to him. “I see you and your brother share the same refined palate,” he says drily. Though he’s speaking to Adam, Michael can tell that Zachariah is aware of where Michael is in the room: he keeps sending not-so-subtle smug looks to the patch of air that Michael occupies.

            “Ah,” Adam mutters, swallowing down his frankly enormous mouthful of burger with apparent difficulty. “So, uh, we ready?”

            The kid looks hopeful, like the idea of finally doing something important has taken hold of him. A strange feeling comes over Michael, one that he’s become entirely too used to in the last few months.

            “For what?” Zachariah says, his voice falsely light. Though he keeps his vessel looking entirely neutral, Michael can see through him to his essence, can see the malicious joy he is going to take in destroying Adam’s hope.

            Adam doesn’t get it, not yet, and Michael can feel his own pity grow. Still, he doesn’t do anything, even as Adam stutters out a, “What do you mean, for what? For Michael.” Things must go to plan, and Michael cannot afford to let his concern for Adam’s feelings cloud his judgment.

            “Oh, right,” Zachariah says, a cruel smirk coming over his face. “About that. Look, this is never easy, but I’m afraid we’ve had to terminate your position at this time.”

            Michael doesn’t miss the subtle dig at himself, but he cannot be concerned with that, not when Adam is finally realizing what is going on. Though he’s not educated, he’s certainly not stupid, and the implications of what Zachariah has said occur to him very quickly. The confession that vessels are a bloodline, the fact that Zachariah had talked so much about Sam and Dean…it must feel like when he first found out he had brothers all over again, accepting the fact that another person had what he so craved, whether it be a present father or a purpose in life.

            “Excuse me?” is all Adam says, but Michael can see the way his eyes are blazing, the way his hands have clenched into fists by his sides. Despite it all, Michael is a bit relieved; it was unsettling to see someone treat Zachariah with even a modicum of respect.  

            “Hey, don’t get me wrong,” Zachariah says. “You’ve been a Hell of a sport, really. Good stuff. But the thing is, you’re not so much the chosen one as you are a clammy scrap of bait.”

            Petty cruelty must make Zachariah feel powerful, Michael decides, because there’s no other reason for him to be quite so blunt. It’s a wonder that he’s still surprised that he is not well-liked.

            “No, but what about that stuff that you said?” Adam asks. He’s still clinging to a bit of hope, despite it all, clinging to the idea that _someone_ needs to do the job. “I’m supposed to fight the devil!”

            “Mmm, not so much,” Zachariah says. “Hey, if it’s any consolation, you happen to be the illegitimate half-brother of the guy we _do_ care about. That’s not bad, is it?”

            Michael has to give Zachariah credit for knowing exactly what to say to cut someone to the quick, to prey on their deepest insecurities and manipulate them. It’s part of the reason why he chose Zachariah for this job, after all. A more guileless angel, one like Castiel, would never be able to pull off the level of deception that Zachariah could.

            Or maybe Castiel was capable of it. After all, not more than a few hours ago, Castiel had beaten Dean Winchester bloody for attempting to sneak away and say yes to Michael. If you had asked Michael yesterday if he thought Castiel able to hurt Dean, for any reason, he would have given an emphatic no.

            In fact, if you had asked Michael a year ago if he thought Castiel able to disobey a direct order from Heaven, he would also have said no.

            “So you lied. About everything.” Adam says flatly. He doesn’t sound entirely surprised, and from that fact, Michael would have been able to deduce that he was never particularly religious, even if he didn’t already know Adam’s past better than Adam himself did. Religious people, even the ones who had actually read the alleged holy book, were always so surprised that angels were capable of being duplicitous. Michael supposed these people had missed the biggest tenet of the religion: obedience to God is everything, superseding even those most basic principles of human morality.

            “We didn’t lie,” Zachariah lies. “We just avoided certain truths in order to manipulate you.”

            “Oh, you son of a bitch,” Adam says lowly, the Winchester in him more obvious than it has ever been.

            “Hey, how do you think _I_ feel?” Zachariah is in rare form, practically dancing around the room as the particulars of his plan fall into place. He must already be envisioning the rewards that God or Michael will bestow upon him. Michael wonders if he thinks he may be promoted to an Archangel, to one of the Seven. After all, he might be thinking, the Seven were dropping like flies, with Uriel and Annael dead, Gabriel and Azrael missing. Plus, if an archangel could be demoted, like Uriel was, didn’t it stand to reason that one could be promoted as well?

            The same thought had occurred to Michael, and of course, if God chooses to come back and do so, he will acquiesce. Still, the idea is so repugnant to him that he has to avoid thinking about it too much.

            “I’m the one who has to put up with that dumb, slack-jawed look on your face,” Zachariah continues. “Kid, we didn’t have a choice. The Winchesters got _one_ blind spot, and it’s family. See, Sam and Dean, they’re gonna put aside their differences and they’re gonna come get you, and that’s gonna put Dean right here,” he indicates the space in front of him. “Right where I need him. This is the night, kid! _Our_ night. Michael’s seen it. The tumblers finally click into place, and it’s all because of you. And me. But who’s keeping score?”

            Throughout Zachariah’s entire supervillain monologue, during which he had thrown out more lies and bullshit than Michael had even thought possible – he’d seen nothing of the sort, he wasn’t omniscient – Adam had quite obviously been growing more and more agitated. “Yeah, I’m not gonna let you do this,” he says, and Michael is struck with that same feeling, that sense of shock and grudging respect, that he’s used to getting from Dean.

            Zachariah scoffs. “Cool your jets, corky,” he says, casting a critical eye over Adam’s thin body and lack of weapons. Zachariah’s quite clearly not worried, and why should he be? Even if Adam could surprise them with a show of strength, it’s not as if he knows how to hurt him, or even how to send him away. “Sit down. We’re doing it together. Plus, you still get your severance. You still get to see your mom, okay?”

            “Why should I believe you?” Adam asks, which is quite possibly the most intelligent thing he’s said all day.

            Zachariah scowls, quite clearly upset that Adam is daring to interrupt him. Michael’s not sure he’s ever met someone who enjoys the sound of his own voice as much as Zachariah does. “You know what? I keep hearing this -” Zachariah makes a mocking _blah blah blah_ motion with his right hand. “But what I want to be hearing is this.”

            He shuts his hand, and Adam’s lungs contract on themselves, causing Adam to fall on to the table, blood dripping from his mouth.

            “Zachariah,” Michael warns, speaking only in Zachariah’s head. It’s the first time he’s made his presence known in a while, and he makes sure he sounds as disapproving as he feels.

            Zachariah scowls, but lets up, and Adam sets upright, blood still staining the corners of his mouth as he gasps for air.

            “It’s not like he has to be alive,” Zachariah replies to Michael, the voice sulky in Michael’s head. “They only have to think he is.”

            “I don’t like your tone,” Michael replies. “I put you on this case, and I can very easily take you off. You would do well not to forget who’s in charge here.”

            Zachariah falls silent, chastened, and that’s when Michael feels an enormous surge of energy from directly outside the room. Leaving Zachariah to watch Adam, Michael takes a look outside, and sees the body of one of his brothers lying on the ground, a ragged-looking hole through his throat. There is a bloody blade on the floor, and none of the other angels he’d assigned to guard duty are anywhere in sight.

            The door to the abandoned muffler factory creaks open, and Sam and Dean Winchester walk in cautiously. They spy the dead angel on the floor, and Dean begins to walk over towards the door to the green room. Dean looks resigned, like a man on his way to the gallows, and Michael fights the churning in his stomach with the assurance that everything is going to plan.

            The one thing that’s not going to plan, though, is Sam. Far from what Michael had expected, far from keeping an eye on Dean, Sam is acting completely normal, seamlessly working with his brother as though he hadn’t tried to sacrifice himself mere hours before. Sam is not stupid, but it may be that his loyalty, the younger-brother hero worship that he’s never been able to quite bury, will lead to his own destruction, as well as the destruction of the world that he tries so hard to save.

            Sam and Dean exchange a quick look, and then they open the small, dingy door, and enter the room.

            Adam is still on the floor, dealing with the aftermath of Zachariah’s attack. Heedless of the danger he’s facing, Dean rushes to his side. “Adam, hey. Hey,” he says urgently, helping Adam to his feet. Sam has chosen not to enter the room as of yet, eyes darting around the empty warehouse.

            “You came for me,” Adam says, dazed, clinging onto Dean.

            “Yeah, well. You’re family,” Dean says gruffly. The two of them start to make their slow, limping way towards the door.

            Adam draws in a slow, rattling breath. “Dean, it’s a trap,” he says, displaying more loyalty than Michael would have expected.

            “I figured,” Dean says softly, and he doesn’t look surprised in the slightest when Zachariah appears in front of him, looking like the cat that got the proverbial canary.

            “Dean, please,” Zachariah says. “Did you really think it would be that easy?”

            “Did _you_?” Dean challenges, and that must have been some sort of signal, because Sam chooses that moment to come rushing inside, eyes blazing and Castiel’s abandoned sword in his hand. He’s poised to strike the killing blow, but Zachariah is faster, knocking the blade off-target and throwing Sam through a nearby wall in one smooth motion.

            “Sam!” Dean cries out, upset despite the fact that he must have known that wouldn’t work.

            Zachariah still looks monstrously smug, not even fazed by Sam’s attempted murder. “You know what I’ve learned from this experience, Dean?” he asks rhetorically. “Patience.” He waves a hand, and Adam, who Dean had let go of when Sam went down, falls to the floor himself, his internal wounds reopened by Zachariah’s hand.

            “Adam?” Dean says, his vocabulary apparently reduced by shock. “Let him go, you son of a bitch.” His voice has lowered to a growl, and he looks dangerous as he turns back to face Zachariah, like a cornered animal.

            “I mean,” Zachariah says loftily, either blissfully unaware of Dean’s anger or else pretending to be. “I thought I was downsized for sure. And for us, a firing? Pretty damn literal. But I should have trusted the boss man. It’s all playing out like he said. You, me, your hemorrhaging brothers…”

            As he trails off, he turns back to Sam and uses the same hand motion he’d used on Adam. Immediately, Sam begins coughing up blood as well. It must be Dean’s worst nightmare, seeing not just one, but both of his younger brothers in such a state.

            “You’re finally ready, right?” Zachariah says, looking at Dean once more. Dean still looks angry, but he is also beginning to look defeated, as if he’s finally realized that he cannot defeat everything that comes his way by railing against its unfairness. His situation is completely hopeless. Every ally he has is either next to him in severe internal distress, trapped in a wheelchair miles away, or else blown to Father only knows where in a desperate suicide attempt. He stands no chance against Zachariah, and even if he could somehow defeat him, Michael is waiting in the wings. All he needs to do is utter one small word, one little ‘yes’, and everything will be made right again.

            This is the moment, Michael can feel it. He pauses for a second to give thanks to his Father, to apologize for the moments of doubt he has experienced.

            Dean still needs a little wheedling, but as he looks from Zachariah to his dying brothers, it is becoming clear that the time is almost upon him.

            “You know there’s no other choice,” Zachariah says, barely able to contain the triumph in his voice. “There’s never been a choice.”

            The horrible choking noises that fill the room increase in volume, and finally, _finally_ , Dean snaps. “Stop it,” he orders. “Stop it right now!”

            Zachariah doesn’t budge. “In exchange for what?” he asks.

            “Damn it, Zachariah,” Dean says, defeated. “Stop it, please. I’ll do it.”

            “I’m sorry, what was that?” Zachariah asks. He casts a glance towards where he knows Michael is hovering, as though he’s a child looking for his father’s approval.

            “Okay, yes,” Dean says. “The answer is yes.”

            Michael is dying to go and possess him, finally, to fulfill his destiny. Unfortunately, the process of obtaining a vessel is a very specific one, and Michael cannot possess Dean until he says yes in response to a very specific question, one that, it appears, Zachariah is too busy gloating to actually ask.

            Zachariah has finally stopped tormenting Sam and Adam, and though neither of them has yet regained enough strength to stand up, Sam has apparently managed to pull enough air into his damaged lungs to speak. “Dean!” he cries, casting his brother a desperate, pleading look.

            Dean is too far gone, though, and he doesn’t even look over at Sam’s cry. “Do you hear me?” he demands. “Call down Michael, you bastard.”

            “How do I know you’re not lying?” Zachariah asks, apparently determined to draw this out for as long as possible. Michael supposes he’ll have to do this on his own; he can sense Lucifer and his minions cutting a swath of destruction across Middle America, and every bit of him is itching to take his vessel and go fight.

            “Do I look like I’m lying?” Dean counters, looking approximately as tired of Zachariah as Michael is. They will get along well, Michael thinks, and soon Dean will regret the amount of time he spent resisting his destiny, once Michael takes care of Lucifer and returns the Earth to its ordinary state.

            Though Zachariah knows that Michael is watching every step of the proceedings, he turns away and begins to chant a summoning spell in Enochian, apparently not finished showboating. The spell causes Michael’s invisibility to fail, and he has to exit the room quickly in order to keep from killing every human in the room with his true form. Though he can no longer see what is happening, hovering outside the building and waiting for Zachariah to actually ask Dean’s permission for Michael to possess him, he can still hear every word, and he is pulled up short when Dean adds, “Of course, I have a few conditions.”

            This is not entirely unexpected, and Michael could probably list every condition that Dean will come up with: protection for Sam, Adam, Castiel, Bobby, and Lisa and Ben Braeden, a promise to kill as few humans as possible in the attempt to save the world. Michael is not unreasonable; he sees no problem with granting these requests.

            “What?” Zachariah asks, once again put out at not being entirely in control of the situation.

            “The few people whose safety you have to guarantee before I say yes,” Dean clarifies.

            “Sure, fine. Make a list,” Zachariah says dismissively.

            “But most of all,” Dean continues, his voice sounding strangely smug. “Michael can’t have me until he disintegrates you.”

            The request brings Michael up short, because it’s so _clever_. He never would have expected that Dean would use the leverage he has in this way, and he’s impressed. He’s ridiculously pleased as well, because an excuse to kill Zachariah is exactly what he has needed.

            Understandably, Zachariah doesn’t seem as happy about this as Michael is. “What did you say?” he asks, his voice quiet and dangerous. Michael can imagine the look on his face, the anger at being outwitted. He enjoys the mental picture immensely.

            “I said,” Dean says deliberately, not cowed in the slightest. “Before Michael gets one piece of this sweet ass, he has to turn you into charcoal.”

            “You really think Michael’s gonna go for that?” Zachariah asks, but Michael can hear the note of panic in his voice that says he knows the answer to that question.

            “Who’s more important to him now? You,” Dean pauses. “Or me?”

            “You listen to me,” Zachariah says, obviously panicking. Michael had stopped entirely when he’d heard Dean’s request, but he is now picking up speed as he hurtles towards the room. He knows that Zachariah can tell he’s getting closer, though he is not detectable to human eyes or ears quite yet. “You are nothing but a maggot inside a worm’s ass. Do you know who I am, after I deliver you to Michael?”

            “Expendable,” is Dean’s prompt answer.

            “Michael’s not gonna kill _me_ ,” Zachariah says without conviction.

            “Maybe not,” Dean concedes. “But I am.”

            Michael stops moving for the second time. He doesn’t know where Dean would have gotten the angel blade – was it Castiel’s? But how could he have picked it up without Zachariah noticing? Or maybe it was another angel’s, but whose? – but he can feel the moment that Zachariah dies, the Grace exploding outwards from his no doubt ruined body. As excited as Michael had been by the prospect of killing Zachariah, he’d counted on doing it himself, and therefore being able to prevent Dean’s escape. Zachariah’s premature death means that Dean, Sam, and Adam are unguarded, and if they manage to escape the building before Michael descends fully, the marks on their ribs will ensure that he loses track of them.

            Trust Zachariah to squander the best chance they’ve yet had. Michael begins moving again, so quickly that the world around him blurs. He knows that the humans must be able to sense his presence now, must see the white light and hear the high-pitched whine that his true form produces.

            When Michael touches down in the room, Sam and Dean are already outside, and though Michael could maybe trap them, he now has no doubt that Dean will die, and more importantly, will let his brothers die, before he says yes to Michael. Instead, he throws his power at the door, slamming it shut, and turns to the unfortunate Adam, who has not yet managed to make it out of the room.

            In his wrath, Michael does not bother to blunt his power, and Adam soon begins bleeding from the ears as well. He screams through his ruined lungs, but the noise in the room is so loud that he likely can’t even hear himself.

            “You know how to make it stop,” Michael says, communicating inside Adam’s brain, ignoring the way it is almost entirely lit up with pain signals. “You must agree to let me possess you. You’re not my first choice, but you appear to be less stubborn than Dean, so you’ll have to do. What do you say?”

            To his credit, Adam holds out for a few seconds before screaming out his assent.

***

            The memory tormented Michael day in and day out, no matter how many years had passed, no matter how certain he was that he had done the right thing.

            Lucifer, in front of him, entirely radiant, and pleading, as much as Lucifer could ever plead, _Michael don’t listen, spare me, Michael, please!_

            Michael could still feel the weight of the sword in his hand, could still remember how it felt to hear Heaven silent for the first and last time.

            He could still remember the wave of doubt and uncertainty, warring with the constant hum of betrayal, of hurt, just under his skin.

            He brought the sword down, down, down, and his world splintered as Lucifer fell from Heaven, never to return.

***

            The end comes, as Michael knew it would, after Detroit and Sam’s "yes". It comes when Lucifer, in his true vessel, touches down in Stull Cemetery and calls out to Michael, telling him that he’s ready to begin.

            Michael doesn’t have time to say anything to the rest of the angels. He’s sure he’ll be able to when he gets back.

            Michael touches down in the cemetery, and there he is. Lucifer. His best friend, his closest companion, the one of his brothers that he had loved above all the rest.

            The one who had betrayed him and broken his heart beyond repair.

            Though Lucifer is in Sam’s body, Michael can see no trace of Sam in him. After a slight pause, Lucifer uses his borrowed mouth to speak. “It’s good to see you, Michael.”

            The words hit Michael hard, and he’s ashamed of the lump that rises in his throat. Hardening his resolve, he answers. “You too. It’s been too long. Can you believe it’s finally here?”

            Lucifer gives a slight, bitter smile. “No, not really.”

            “Are you ready?” Michael asks. Though he’s not in the optimal situation here, possessing a subpar vessel, he knows he will win, just as he knows that God is good. Today will be the day that Lucifer dies at Michael’s hands.

            “As I’ll ever be,” Lucifer says. “A part of me wishes we didn’t have to do this.”

            Michael recognizes the attempt at manipulation immediately, but he allows himself to reply with a quiet, “Yeah. Me too,” anyway.

            It’s all the opening that Lucifer needs. “Then why are we?” he asks, stepping forward and using Sam’s puppy dog eyes to his full advantage.

            “Oh, you know why!” Michael shoots back. “I have no choice, after what you did.”

            “What _I_ did?” Lucifer says. “What if it’s not my fault?”

            “What is that supposed to mean?” Michael asks. He knows what Lucifer is trying to do, sees his angle, and hates himself a little bit for falling for it. Still, he is going to follow his orders. What does it matter if he spends a little time talking with his brother?

            “Think about it,” Lucifer says. “Dad made everything. Which means he made me who I am! God wanted the Devil.”

            It’s something that Michael has considered before, the idea that evil is not something separate from God, but a part of God. When he was younger, more naïve, the idea used to disturb him. After running Heaven by himself for so long, though, he knows the importance of doing anything possible to keep his underlings in check, including creating a concrete enemy for them to fight so they don’t turn on him. “So?” he asks, and he can tell that he has thrown Lucifer for a loop, because the Michael that Lucifer had once known would never consider God capable of evil.

            To Lucifer’s credit, he recovers remarkably quickly. “So why?” he asks. “And why make us fight? I just can’t figure out the point.”

            Michael is abruptly reminded of a human idiom he’d once heard. ‘The Devil’s greatest trick is making you think he doesn’t exist’. Michael disagrees. Lucifer’s greatest trick is making you like him. “What’s your point?” he asks coldly.

            “We’re going to kill each other,” Lucifer states bluntly. “And for what? One of Dad’s tests. And we don’t even know the answer. We’re brothers. Let’s just walk off the chessboard.”

            Michael doesn’t think he’s been more tempted by anything in his entire existence. All of the intellect in the world, all of his conviction that he’s doing the right thing and that Lucifer is just trying to manipulate him, doesn’t stop the tug of affection he gets in his gut when he looks at Lucifer, doesn’t erase the good times that they’d had in Heaven, when they were more like one being than two. “I’m sorry,” Michael says, and he knows Lucifer can hear the weakness in his voice. “I-I can’t do that. I’m a good son, and I have my orders.”

            “But you don’t have to follow them,” Lucifer says, as though that’s an idea that’s never occurred to any other being except him. Michael wants to tell him that he is no longer special, that both Annael and Castiel have followed in his footsteps, albeit without destroying quite so many innocent lives.

            “What, you think I’m gonna rebel?” Michael asks. “ _Now?_ I’m not like you.”

            Lucifer doesn’t point out the lie, either because he doesn’t need to or because he still holds esteem for Michael. It may be both; Lucifer has always been good at twisting things to his advantage. “Please, Michael-” he begins, and he is, in that moment, so much like a little brother that Michael can’t stand it.

            He just wants this to be over. He wants it to stop, the constant tugs on his soul, the responsibility that he was never meant to carry. He doesn’t know if he’s going to die in this battle, but part of him thinks it would be the better outcome. The Seven are decimated as it is; what will the death of one more matter?

            It may be better for Heaven as well. Michael has no doubt who will take over Heaven if he dies, and he only hopes that Castiel’s steadfastness of heart will prove enough for the job.

            Still, it is best not to get ahead of himself. Best to focus on the task at hand, and let God, wherever he is, enact His plan.

            “You know, you haven’t changed a bit, little brother,” Michael says, deliberately making his voice cold. “Always blaming everyone but yourself. We were together -” and here, Michael’s act slips a little, enough that he knows Lucifer must have seen it. “We were happy. But you betrayed me – all of us – and you made our father leave.”

            “No one makes Dad do anything,” Lucifer says, allowing the ‘you know that as well as I do’ go unsaid. “He is doing this to us.”

            “You’re a monster, Lucifer,” Michael says. It’s the truth, as much as he hates it.

            As much as he knows that he’s a monster as well. “And I have to kill you,” he finishes.

            “If that’s the way it’s got to be,” Lucifer gives a practiced shrug and spreads his arms out wide, borrowed hands large and intimidating. “Then I’d like to see you try.”

            Michael nods once, and then shifts into a fighting stance, his blade manifesting with barely a thought.

            Across the cemetery, Lucifer is doing much the same, but while Michael is the picture of a soldier – shoulders back, feet spread, knees slightly bent, eyes trained on his opponent – Lucifer is affecting carelessness, still standing in much the same relaxed way that he was before, now with his own sword in his hand.

            Michael knows that it is meant to lull him into a false sense of security, so he doesn’t allow his own stance to shift for even a millisecond, not even as he and Lucifer slowly begin to circle each other in the abandoned graveyard.

            And then, all at once comes the unmistakable sound of a car revving, a car that, judging from the quality of the noise, has seen its share of driving over the years, and the cemetery is no longer abandoned.

            Michael registers his own shock at about the same time he sees it affect Lucifer, though by the time the sound of an eighties heavy-metal classic begins to fill the cemetery, Lucifer has recovered.

            There is only one person to whom that car and that horrid taste in music can possibly belong, and Michael’s theory is proven right when the black 1967 Chevrolet Impala drives right up in between he and Lucifer. Dean himself, still from behind the wheel, calls out “Howdy, boys!” then, with mock concern, adds, “Sorry, am I interrupting something?”

            It’s not an entirely unexpected development, given how often Dean has hurled himself on various metaphorical grenades for Sam in the past, but Michael would have thought he would at least be smart enough to keep himself out of this particular fight.

            Lucifer seems to have been assuming the same thing. After Dean turns off the Impala, abruptly cutting off the harsh strains of what Michael recognizes as Def Leppard, for whatever reason, he turns to Lucifer, completely ignoring Michael, and says “Hey, we need to talk,” as though he is still talking to his little brother and not to Satan himself. Lucifer’s answer is, “Dean. Even for you, this is a whole new mountain of stupid.”

            “I’m not talking to you,” Dean replies. “I’m talking to Sam.”

            Despite himself, Michael does not want to see Lucifer eviscerate Dean, so he cuts off whatever Lucifer’s reply is going to be by saying, “You’re no longer the vessel, Dean. You got no right to be here.”

            If Michael thought there was even the slightest chance of getting Dean to say yes right now, he would abandon Adam. He’s finally accepted, though, that there is no weapon in his arsenal strong enough to make Dean kill Sam. It may be the chief difference between Dean and Michael.

            Dean’s only response is, “Adam, if you’re in there somewhere, I am so sorry.”

            “Adam isn’t home right now,” Michael says. It’s mostly true; Adam hadn’t stopped fighting him since Van Nuys, and so Michael, annoyed, had finally pushed his consciousness so far down that he is no longer aware of what’s going on around him. Though it was not Michael’s intention, it might be construed as a kindness.

            Dean appears determined to keep up his pretense of speaking only with the vessels, and not with the angels inside, though he must know that they cannot hear him. Still, he looks at Michael scornfully and says, “Well, then you’re next on my list, buttercup. But right now I need five minutes with him.” He gestures to Lucifer, who presses his hand to his chest and mouths ‘Me?’, eyes wide in false shock.

            Michael’s temper has already worn thin with this entire situation, and he explodes, albeit more quietly than another being might. “You little maggot,” he says, taking a page out of Zachariah’s book. “You are no longer part of this story!” Can’t Dean see that Michael is trying to help him, is trying to get him away from Lucifer?

            Either he doesn’t see, or, more likely, he doesn’t care, because he just turns away. Michael is about to step closer to him, whether to punch him or to banish him halfway across the globe, he’s not sure, when he hears a gravelly voice behind him call out, “Hey, ass-butt!”

            If the voice weren’t enough to alert Michael to this interloper’s identity, then the substandard grasp on human insults would be.

            He whirls around and sees Castiel, standing upright and proud in the vessel that is becoming more and more of his body every day as his power wanes. Standing next to him is Bobby Singer, out of his wheelchair for the first time in almost a year. Bobby’s legs are an indication that something is wrong with this picture, because there’s no way that human medical science has come far enough to reverse his paralysis, and Castiel’s droplets of power aren’t strong enough to heal such a massive wound. However, Michael doesn’t have time to focus on that; he is more concerned with the flaming bottle that Castiel has hurled at him while he was distracted.

            The bottle hits its mark, and Michael screams as the flames begin to lick at him. Holy fire. It seems that Castiel’s brain has not atrophied along with his powers.

            The shock of the flames licking at his Grace causes Michael to completely lose control of himself, which must be what Castiel was anticipating. By the time Michael manages to put himself out, ignoring Adam’s screams far down in his consciousness, he has nearly made it back to Heaven.

            Afraid of what must have happened in the nearly five minutes he’s been gone, Michael flies back to Earth as quickly as he can manage. He can feel this opportunity slipping through his fingers, the opportunity to finally defeat Lucifer once and for all. He consoles himself with the fact that there’s no way the Winchesters could have figured out how to defeat Lucifer.

            His conviction vanishes as soon as he touches back down in Stull Cemetery. He takes stock of his surroundings at lightning speed, noting the chunks of matter littering the ground that used to be Castiel, the twisted corpse of Bobby Singer. Dean, cowering against the Impala, face swollen and bloody.

            And Sam, because it is Sam, back in control of his own body, Lucifer howling in rage below the surface. Near Sam’s feet, a hole has opened up in the Earth, and Michael can feel the darkness that it is emitting. It must lead back to Lucifer’s cage.

            “Sam!” Michael shouts, desperate. “It’s not gonna end this way! Step back!” He can see Sam’s plan clearly, can see how he’s poised to jump into the hole, taking Lucifer with him and locking him back up. Michael cannot allow that to happen. Michael will not allow that to happen.

            “You’re gonna have to make me,” Sam says his voice raised over the noise of the hole, and much as Michael would like to snap his neck right here and now, that would defeat the purpose of this whole exercise.

            “I have to fight my brother, Sam!” Michael says, his voice dangerously close to pleading. “Here and now! It’s my destiny!”

            Sam doesn’t listen, just casts one last look at his brother and turns to the hole. He closes his eyes and spreads his arms wide, a parody of Christ on the cross.

            Acting entirely on instinct, Michael surges forward and grabs on to Sam’s jacket, meaning to pull him back from the edge and _make_ him stand and fight. Sam appears to have anticipated this, though, because he latches onto Michael’s arm with a grip like iron.

            For one long, suspended second, the two of them stand there, teetering on the edge. Then they plunge forward, directly into the hole.

            There is a prolonged rush of sound in Michael’s ears, and then silence.

***

            Michael has never been to Hell before, but he’s heard stories. He’s heard of the way the legions of Hell tormented those souls impure or unlucky enough to earn a place there, how it was constantly filled with a chorus of screaming as souls were flayed, cut, and burned by grinning demons.

            He knew of the fire and brimstone that filled the place, how it sapped an angel’s strength, how even the most stalwart of God’s servants could lose faith when they saw the horrors that took place there.

            At first, Michael thought that the Cage was nothing like that.

            It looked, for all the world, like just another place on Earth, albeit one that he couldn’t escape, and that didn’t change. It seemed to be just an innocuous room, almost like the holding room in Van Nuys where Michael had taken over the body of Adam Milligan, whose soul was now trapped in the cage with them.

            Though the cage was far enough removed from the rest of Hell that the sounds of torture, if it did go on, the smell of burning flesh and decaying bodies, didn’t reach its occupants, it couldn’t be said that it was a peaceful place. No place could be, not when it contained an angry Lucifer.

            Though humans tended to associate the figure of the devil with fire, heat, the color red, Michael had always thought the opposite. No, Lucifer was ice; he was cold, calculating, and completely willing to take his time breaking the spirits of others.

            Even though there were two completely helpless human souls in the cage with them, Lucifer did not take his anger out in a physical matter. No, Lucifer knew that Sam, at least, would be less affected by physical pain than he was by emotional and mental torture.

            As for poor Adam, well. He didn’t stand a chance.

            Lucifer was a master of this space, comfortable in a way that he’d never seemed in Heaven or on Earth. Lucifer was a creature of the dark, of the shadows.

            It only took Michael a short time to admit that he was beautiful, elegant. _Admirable_.

            And so, the first time Lucifer turned to Michael in their cage, having reduced Adam’s soul to gibbering and writhing on the floor with just a few words, and said, “Your turn, brother,” his tone entirely confident, Michael nodded and stepped forward, focusing on Sam.

            And just like that, they were a team again. Lucifer and Michael. Michael and Lucifer. The way it was meant to be, no matter what God’s plan said.

  
%MCEPASTEBIN%


	8. The Book of Zadkiel

[41]

She carried a book, either to imply

She was one of us, with us

 

or to suggest she was satisfied

with our purpose, a tribute to the Angels;

 

yet though the campanili spoke,

 _Gabriel_ , _Azrael_ ,

 

though the campanili answered,

 _Raphael_ , _Uriel_ ,

 

though a distant note over-water chimed

 _Annael_ , and _Michael_

 

was implicit from the beginning,

another, deep, un-named, resurging bell

 

answered, sounding through them all:

remember, where there was

 

_no need of the moon to shine…_

_I saw no temple._

[42]

Some call that deep-deep bell

 _Zadkiel_ , the righteousness of God,

 

he is regent of Jupiter

or Zeus-pater or Theus-pater,

 

 _Theus_ , God; God-the-father, father-god

or the Angel god-father,

 

himself, Heaven yet at home in a star

whose colour is amethyst,

 

whose candle burns deep-violet

with the others.

***

            The Winchesters have been in Heaven more often than any other human in the history of existence, and still Zadkiel hasn’t met them.

            He’s not afraid, per se, and certainly not of them, but he’s had millennia to come to terms with his own nature, and he knows that if he lets himself get attached, he’ll become the next Castiel.

            Zadkiel enjoys his existence, enjoys spending his time with the brothers and sisters he has left, enjoys doing what he can to help humanity. Meeting an untimely end at the hands of whichever of his brothers is militantly against the Winchesters at present is not a pleasant prospect.

            The brother in question, at the moment, is Zachariah, who is nearly exploding with apoplectic anger in the corner of Zadkiel’s consciousness.

            It’s really disappointing, actually, how completely incompetent Zachariah has proven himself to be at dealing with them. Certainly, Zachariah has never been particularly intelligent or adept, nothing more than a pawn with delusions of grandeur, but this is a blunder that is almost artistic, almost impressive in its scope.

            Part of Zadkiel wants to help him just because of that. Call him soft (Father knows the rest of the Seven used to love to do so), but he doesn’t like seeing this much failure. It inspires a kind of secondhand emotion in him, something between pity and embarrassment.

            He doesn’t, of course, because he has taken it upon himself to make a decision exactly once in his existence, and he is not keen to repeat the results of that mistake.

            He contents himself with sitting, as he always does, watching Zachariah and his minions getting steadily more agitated as Sam and Dean elude them again and again.

            Usually, when they come to Heaven, Sam and Dean first find each other, and then rail at the unpleasantness of the way Heaven manifests for humans, before being found and unceremoniously sent back to Earth, memories wiped, to continue marching toward their destiny. This script is never changed, except for when they occasionally run into that little band of human freedom fighters, painstakingly restructuring Heaven with their string theory, an endeavor that seems to Zadkiel rather like a group of ants trying to take down a skyscraper.

            It’s all very predictable, is the crux of it, and that’s what makes this trip so unusual. Sam and Dean seem to have a mission, a purpose in their visit, as though they remember when they have been here in the past, or at least expect to remember this one in the future.

            It has to be Castiel, leading them through Heaven in a last-ditch effort to try and avert the apocalypse. Zadkiel can’t help but admire their gumption, just a little bit. Still, it’s not as though it would work: there is no being in Heaven that could possibly help them, not since God left.

            The Winchesters’ Heavens are strange, even for humans. For Dean, who had a little bit of the mythical happy childhood, back when his mother was alive, some of the scenes are predictable: Mary, the happy housewife, in the kitchen making pie; John doing fatherly things like playing ball and giving Dean rides on his shoulders. The day that Sam came home, this new little person whom the young Dean vowed to protect for the rest of his life, even before he knew he’d have reason to.

            Then, abruptly, the memories stop, for quite a while. Zadkiel can fill in the blanks: Mary’s death, John’s increased drinking, the beginning of the motel lifestyle.

            When Dean’s memories pick up again, they are much the same as Sam’s earliest ones: little pockets of happiness in a lifestyle of monotony and early responsibility, of fear and pain. Truck-stop Christmases wind in between each boy’s first kill, the first time Dean became truly proficient with a shotgun, the first time that Sam discovered something about a monster that John didn’t know.

            After this, the memories start to diverge again, and Sam’s happiness pulls away from his father and his brother, rearranges to include the times he feels normal. They fast forward through middle school, high school, Stanford, and then, just like Dean’s, they drop off with the death of another blond woman, over twenty years after the first, bloody and aflame on the ceiling.

            Still later, the memories begin to include Bobby Singer, Ellen and Jo Harvelle, even Castiel.

            All in all, the Winchesters’ Heavens are a harsh reminder that the system is not perfect, is heavily skewed towards those who were happy in life.

            Zadkiel watches Sam and Dean discover this for the umpteenth time, watches Dean get angry at Sam for so obviously treasuring the memories of the time they have apart.

            And then, Zadkiel watches Zachariah find them, corner them in one of Dean’s earliest memories with a specter of their mother.

            Again, this shows a marked difference from the times Sam and Dean have been in Heaven before. The other times, the Winchesters had expressed a sort of reluctant happiness to see Zachariah, to be sent back to Earth to continue to fight him.

            Now, though, Zachariah has to use force, and Zadkiel, with his damnable soft heart, which has gotten him into so much trouble before, cringes at it.

            “Then how about I tell you about my nightmare, Dean? The night I burned?” Zachariah makes his clone of Mary say, before blood blooms on the front of her crisp white nightgown.

            In the gloom of their childhood home, Dean steps backwards from the specter, grabbing onto Sam’s arm. “Sammy, let’s get out of here,” he says, but the tremor in his voice gives his fear and pain away. Sam doesn’t move, just fixes his eyes on Mary, and Zadkiel wonders if he sees Jessica when he looks at her.

            “Don’t you walk away from me,” the Mary-creature snarls, her pretty face twisting into something ugly. Dean stops moving, even though he must know something horrible is coming.

            “I never loved you,” the Mary-creature says, and Zadkiel winces as the blood drains out of Dean’s face. It is the worst, the cruelest thing that Zachariah could possibly make her say, but that’s what Zachariah is good at, taking a weakness in a person and mercilessly exploiting it.

            “You were my burden,” the Mary-creature continues, giving voice to those words that Zadkiel knows Dean has thought to himself in the depths of his self-loathing, when he feels he’s failed to protect Sam, or the entire rest of the world. “I was shackled to you. Look what it got me.” The Mary-creature blinks, and her eyes turn that horrible, sickly yellow color that haunted Dean’s childhood dreams: the color of Azazel’s eyes.

            Dean still hasn’t moved, the horror showing in each line of his face, but something about the situation, maybe the fact that he had never known Mary, causes Sam to be a little calmer, a little more clear-headed. “Dean,” he says softly, and his is the one voice that can break the influence of Mary’s. Dean turns to his brother, and the two of them share a long look, but it appears that Zachariah is not quite finished yet.

            The Mary-creature’s eyes flick back to normal, and she continues speaking. “The worst was the smell,” she says, and that is what causes Sam to tear his eyes away from Dean, meeting hers.

            She smirks. “The pain, well. What can you say about your skin bubbling off?” The images she conjures are horrible, and, Zadkiel knows, entirely accurate. He’s seen more than his fair share of humans burned, in accidents and for witchcraft and by acts of God, and each time he hasn’t been able to fathom their pain. “But the smell was so…” The Mary-creature trails off and shrugs, then tilts her head at Sam in a sort of ‘you understand’ gesture. “You know, for a second I thought I’d left a pot roast burning in the oven. But it was my meat.”

            Now Dean is the one who is moving, while Sam stares at the creature, eyes haunted. Dean moves to the exit, but finds that the room has changed around them and all the doors have disappeared, neatly trapping them.

            “And then, finally, I was dead,” the Mary-creature concludes nonchalantly. “The one silver lining was that at least I was away from you. Everybody leaves you, Dean. You noticed? Mommy. Daddy. Even Sam.”

            Sam looks stricken, but does not deny it. How can he? It’s true, after all, even if what he’d done would never have been considered abandonment in a normal family.

            “You ever ask yourself why?” the creature asks, though it must know he has. “Maybe it’s not them. Maybe it’s you.” She laughs, cruelly, and that’s when Zachariah decides to make his appearance.

            “Easy now, kitten,” he says, coming up behind the creature, the oiliness of his voice disguising his impotent rage, which Zadkiel can sense coming off him in waves.

            “You did this,” Sam says. He looks like he’s trying to convince himself as much as he’s trying to accuse Zachariah. For one wild moment, Zadkiel considers finding the real Mary Winchester, the one whose favorite memories include Dean and Sam’s short childhood, the one who would never, ever blame either of them for anything, and bringing her here, allowing her to smooth this over. He dismisses the thought immediately. He must keep his head down, mustn’t draw attention to himself. Mustn’t open himself up to Michael’s wrath.

            “And I’m just getting started!” Zachariah announces gleefully, while his creation looks on approvingly. “I mean, guys. Did you really think you could just sneak past me into Mission Control?”

            “You son of a bitch,” Sam hisses, enormous hands curling up into fists.

            Zachariah merely smiles at him, and two of his underlings appear behind Sam and Dean, ready to prevent them from making an escape, or else trying to take on Zachariah with their bare hands. It’s an unnecessary gesture, really; it’s not like they could go anywhere, or do any damage to Zachariah. He simply enjoys the trappings of power, the idea that he has the authority to order his brothers around.

            Zadkiel really wishes Michael had chosen a better angel for his second-in-command. It wouldn’t have made a difference in the bottom line, of course, but it would have been kinder.

            “You know, I’d say the same thing about you Sam,” Zachariah says easily. “But I have actually grown quite fond of your mother. Or at least the blessed memory of her.”

            Zachariah comes up close to the Mary-creature and moves a strand of her hair out of the way, before bending down and trailing his lips over her neck. The Mary-creature closes her eyes and leans her weight fully back against him, tilting her head back.

            Both Winchester brothers recoil away. Even Zadkiel can see how grotesque of a spectacle it is, as Zachariah’s vessel is significantly older than the Mary-creature. Even in their true forms, it is not a pretty sight.

            “I think we’re going to be logging a lot of quality time together,” Zachariah continues. “I’ve discovered she’s quite the…MILF.”

            The slang term sounds strange on Zachariah’s tongue, and Zadkiel can tell just how much he’s enjoying this.

            “You can gloat all you want, you dick, but you’re still bald,” Dean fires back, characteristically defiant. Zadkiel can practically see him reassuring himself that the creature, who is alternating between adoring looks at Zachariah and smug ones at he and Sam, is not actually his mother.

            “In Heaven, I have six wings and four faces, one of whom is a lion,” Zachariah snaps back. He conveniently leaves out the fact that this is unimpressive among the rest of the angels; even Castiel, low-ranking and power-drained as he is, boasts more wings than Zachariah. “You see this because you’re limited.” He runs his hand down the Mary-creature’s arm one last time, then gives a showy snap, banishing her away.

            Zadkiel can see Dean heave a sigh of relief, but neither he nor Sam relax their confrontational postures.

            “Let’s brass tack this, shall we?” Zachariah asks.

            “You gonna ball-gag us until we say yes?” Dean says, his question equally as rhetorical as Zachariah’s had been. “Huh, yeah, I’ve heard that one too.”

            It appears that Zachariah is sick of the messing around. In one smooth motion, he steps forward and slams his fist into Dean’s stomach, knocking the wind out of him. Dean doubles over with a groan, the two angels still holding his arms the only thing keeping him from falling entirely.

            “I’m going to do a lot more than that,” Zachariah promises, his voice low and dangerous. “Get him up.”

            Zachariah’s lackeys obey, forcing Dean to stand up straight, only for Zachariah to hit him again. Sam begins to struggle against his own captors, trying to get to his brother, but they hold him fast; even Sam’s impressive height is no match for angel strength.

            “Let me tell you something,” Zachariah begins, and Zadkiel settles in for a monologue. “I was on the fast track once. Employee of the month, every month, forever. I would walk these halls and people would avert their eyes!” He yells the last three words in frustration, causing the house around him to shake. “I had respect. And then they assigned me you. Now look at me.” Zachariah chuckles mirthlessly. “I can’t close the deal on a couple of flannel-wearing maggots? Everybody’s laughing at me, and they’re right to do it.”

            Zachariah has appeared to be stuck in his own head for the entire speech thus far, but he suddenly draws himself up to his full height and focuses his attention back on Dean, voice brightening. “So! Say yes, don’t say yes; I’m still going to take it out of your asses. It’s personal now, and the last person in the history of creation you want for your enemy is me. And I’ll tell you why. Lucifer may be strong, but I’m…” He pauses for a moment, looking like he’s trying to select the right word. Zadkiel agrees wholeheartedly with the one he ends up selecting. “…Petty. I’m going to be the angel on your shoulder for the rest of eternity.”

            “Excuse me. Sir?” A new voice speaks up, and Zachariah deflates. He turns to glare at the newcomer, whom Zadkiel instantly recognizes as Joshua, the angel in charge of looking after the main garden of Heaven. This is an unusual occurrence; Joshua is rarely seen outside of his domain, and Zadkiel can’t recall ever seeing him interrupt someone.

            “I’m in a meeting,” Zachariah says, withering. Joshua gives a slight smile, face placid in the face of Zachariah’s anger, and does not back down.

            “I’m sorry,” he says politely. “But I need to speak to those two.” He gestures to Sam and Dean, who have stopped struggling against their captors and are looking on, confused.

            “Excuse me?” Zachariah says. It seems that in the small amount of time that he has been Michael’s go-to brute, he has forgotten what it feels like to take orders from lower-ranking angels. Zadkiel finds it immensely satisfying to watch.

            “It’s a bad time, I know,” Joshua says, still calm as Zachariah grows visibly more and more annoyed. “But I’m afraid I have to insist.”

            “You don’t get to insist jack-squat,” Zachariah bites out. Behind him, Dean has begun to smile, despite the pain he must be in.

            “No, you’re right,” Joshua says. “But the boss does. His orders.”

            With that small sentence, those simple words, Zadkiel’s life is turned upside down. The boss. God. Can it be true? Can Joshua, lowly gardener of Heaven, really have a direct line to the Almighty? Or is he merely bluffing, trying, for whatever reason, to help get Sam and Dean away from Zachariah?

            It appears that Zachariah is having the same thoughts as Zadkiel. “You’re lying,” he says, but he sounds uncertain. Disobeying a direct order from God is the ultimate blasphemy, and even a faithless peon like Zachariah would not dare to risk it.

            “I wouldn’t lie about this,” Joshua replies. “Look, fire me if you want. Sooner or later, he’s going to come back home, and you know how he is with the whole wrath thing.”

            Zadkiel definitely does.

            There is a long moment where Zachariah looks between Joshua and the still captive Winchesters, every line of his body projecting uncertainty. Then, he appears to come to the same conclusion that Zadkiel would have, were he in the same position, and disappears without a trace, taking his goons with him.

            Sam and Dean, suddenly free, turn to Joshua, who smiles, and, without using any of the showy tricks that other angels do, transports them to his garden.

            Zadkiel follows, intrigued. He watches as Sam and Dean take a long look around the garden, confused, before Sam finally speaks up. “This is Heaven’s garden?” he asks.

            “It’s nice. Ish. I guess,” Dean adds.

            “You see what you want to see here,” Joshua explains. “For some, it’s God’s throne room; for others, it’s Eden. You two, I believe it’s the Cleveland Botanical Gardens. You came here on a field trip.”

            It’s an odd experience for Zadkiel, seeing Sam and Dean explore the garden. He himself sees Eden, nearly unchanged from the time of Adam and Eve. It’s lush and green, but uncontrolled, wild. Animals walk and slink and crawl and slither through the underbrush, and the trees grow up wild and gnarled. Birdsong of every kind mixes in with the low drone of cicadas and the chattering of monkeys. Plants and animals have no discrimination here: pine trees grow next to bamboo shoots, monkey puzzles, and palms; Kentucky bluegrass gives way seamlessly to the mossy floor of a tropical rainforests; and polar bears and penguins walk around without any care as to the mild climate. It’s the nexus of creation, the first place, and Sam and Dean Winchester walk past it all unaware. Instead, they bend down to examine things Zadkiel cannot see, walk through trees and bushes that apparently aren’t there for them, and completely ignore the animals that come within feet of them.

            “You’re Joshua,” Sam says. Zadkiel surmises that they must, for some reason, have come looking for him. Maybe Castiel knows something about the Heavenly chain of command that Zadkiel does not, though he cannot see how that could be true.

            “I’m Joshua,” Joshua confirms with a nod.

            “So, you talk to God,” Sam says.

            “Mostly He talks to me,” Joshua says.

            “Well, we need to speak to Him. It’s important,” Sam says. Zadkiel admires his courage, but surely he can’t believe that it is that easy, that he can have a phone call with God through Joshua?

            “Where is he?” Dean asks.

            “On Earth,” is Joshua’s ready reply, and Zadkiel is once again shocked to his core. A part of him, a large part, wants to leave Heaven for the first time in centuries, wants to go down to Earth and search out his Father.

            Instead, he stays put and listens.

            “Doing what?” is Dean’s question.

            “I don’t know.”

            “Do you know where on Earth?” Sam sounds eager, excited, in stark contrast to his brother, who just looks annoyed.

            “No, sorry,” Joshua says, and Zadkiel finds himself disappointed, even if he hadn’t really expected it to be that easy. “We don’t exactly speak face-to-face.”

            “I don’t get it,” Dean says bluntly. “God’s not talking to nobody, so…”

            “Why is he talking to me?” Joshua finishes, before heaving a sigh and shrugging his shoulders. “I sometimes think it’s because I can sympathize – gardener to gardener – and, between us, I think he gets lonely.”

            Dean scoffs. “Well, my heart’s breaking for him,”

            “Well, can you at least get him a message for us?” Sam says, interrupting Dean before he can say something truly unflattering about God.

            “Actually, he has a message for you,” Joshua pauses. “Back off.”

            Zadkiel suspects the message is paraphrased.

            “What?” Dean demands, covering up his shock with hostility.

            “He knows already. Everything you want to tell him.”

            They must have known that God knows all, sees all, but Zadkiel can still see how unbalanced the Winchesters are by this revelation. It must feel like the most immense betrayal of all.

            “But…” Dean says weakly, but Joshua interrupts him.

            “He knows what the angels are doing,” Joshua says, and Zadkiel can feel his own hope plummeting along with Sam and Dean’s. Despite knowing it was to happen since the beginning of time, despite having thought he had reconciled himself to it, Zadkiel does not want the Apocalypse to happen. He does not want the humans to die out, does not want to see all the beauty and complexity of Earth, God’s greatest creation, taken away. Not for the first time in his very long existence, Zadkiel finds himself questioning what the point of it all is. Why create something just to see it destroyed? Why allow evil to continue when you can strike it down with barely a thought? Why send a messenger to cleanse the world of sin in the most painful and inhumane manner possible, when you are the one who created the sin in the first place?

            God is vast and unknowable, and frankly, irrational.

            “He knows that the Apocalypse has begun,” Joshua continues. “He just doesn’t think it’s his problem.”

            “Not his _problem_?” Dean parrots, apparently stunned by the level of carelessness such a statement implies.

            “God saved you already,” Joshua points out. “He put you on that plane. He brought back Castiel. He granted you salvation in Heaven. And after everything you’ve done, too.” He directs the last part at Sam, wayward little Sam, the demon blood still leaving a visible dark stain on his soul. “It’s more than he’s intervened in a long time. He’s finished. Magic amulet or not, you won’t be able to find him.”

            “But he can stop it. He can stop all of it,” Dean says.

            “I suppose he could,” Joshua says. “But he won’t.”

            “Why not?”

            “Why does he allow evil in the first place?” Joshua counters, unintentionally giving voice to Zadkiel’s thoughts. “You could drive yourself nuts asking questions like that.”

            “So he’s just going to sit back and watch the world burn?” Dean asks, his voice getting louder as it goes on. Beside him, Sam is silent, expressing his own devastation only through his facial expression.

            “I know how important this was to you, Dean,” Joshua says, as though he’s making his excuses for a missed dinner or a toy he can’t afford. “I’m sorry.”

            “Forget it,” Dean snaps, his face closing off. “Just another deadbeat Dad with a bunch of excuses. Right. I’m used to that. I’ll muddle through.” He doesn’t sound at all hopeful, a fact with Joshua picks up on immediately.

            “Except you don’t know if you can, this time,” Joshua says. “You can’t kill the Devil, and you’re losing faith, in yourself, your brother, and now this?”

            Sam and Dean share a long look with each other. Dean’s face is like stone.

            “God was your last hope,” Joshua says gently. “I just…I wish I could tell you something different.”

            “How do we know you’re telling the truth?” Sam asks.

            “You think that I would lie?” It’s not an answer, but then, Zadkiel doesn’t really expect one.

            “It’s just that…you’re not exactly the first angel we’ve met,” Sam says, trying for delicacy.

            “I’m rooting for you boys!” Joshua says, his words as well as his newly buoyant attitude signaling the end of the conversation. “I wish I could do more to help you, I do! But I just trim the hedges.”

            “So what now?” Dean asks flatly.

            “You go home again,” Joshua replies. “I’m afraid this time won’t be like the last. This time, God wants you to remember.” With a simple wave of his hand, Joshua banishes the brothers back to Earth.

            Shocked and silent, Zadkiel spends a long moment hovering in place, trying to process what he has just heard. After a few moments, Joshua, who has, true to his word, begun trimming a hedge that Zadkiel can’t see, speaks.

            “The thing about free will, Zadkiel,” he says, not looking even as Zadkiel makes himself visible. “Is that it is not truly free will if God interferes.”

            Zadkiel does not answer. There is no question he can ask that Joshua will answer, nothing he can say to make this experience better. He feels entirely connected to the Winchesters, their despair taking over his own thoughts.

            Joshua finally turns away from his work. To Zadkiel’s surprise, his eyes are twinkling. “God cannot see the outcome of this, and neither can I. But I’ll tell you one thing. If there are any humans who can save the planet, it is those two.”

            Zadkiel cannot stop himself from speaking. “How do you know all this? Who are you?”

            Joshua just smiles mysteriously and turns back to his invisible hedge. “Really, Zadkiel. It’s not a difficult conclusion. My name hasn’t changed _that_ much.”

            As easily as he had banished the Winchesters, Joshua (a Hebraic name, originally spelled _Yeshua_ , sometimes _Yeshu_ , _Yesu_ , _Jesu_ , and Zadkiel _gets_ it, feels a swelling of hope the likes of which he hasn’t experienced for years, for _centuries_ ) sends Zadkiel away, reeling across Heaven.

***

            The last time Zadkiel went to Earth, before the Winchesters and the Apocalypse demanded his attention, was in the old times, sometime after Sodom and Gomorrah and before the Annunciation of Christ.

            Those were the times when humans still lived in fear of God, still had a chance of being chosen, personally integrated into God’s plan.

            (The Winchesters, of course, are personally integrated into God’s plan, along with the prophets and, to a lesser extent, those people who are the vessels of various angels. But it was much more common, much more clear, back then.)

            There was a man called Abraham, one of many men called Abraham, but this one was different, this one was chosen.

            It could be called a blessing and a curse to be chosen by God, in some cases one more than the other; for Abraham, it was certainly a curse.

            Abraham’s task was simple in its horror. In order to prove his devotion to God, the jealous God, the horrible God, the God who giveth and the God who taketh away, he must sacrifice his only son.

            The mountain that God had chosen to host the deed was three days’ ride away from Abraham’s home, and Zadkiel had been dispatched to follow him the entire way, to make sure he did not try to weasel out of his duty or dawdle too much on the way.

            Zadkiel didn’t have much experience with humans, not then and certainly not now; the Abraham affair was something of a trial by fire, so to speak, because Zadkiel had never experienced such anguish as Abraham felt over those three days.

            He hasn’t since.

            The target of God’s wrath, Isaac, was a boy of about ten, happy and lively. For the entire three day journey to Moriah, Isaac ran ahead of his father and the two men Abraham had chosen to accompany them, shouting and playing. He would pick up a stick from the ground and thrust it at invisible enemies, shouting about how he was a warrior for God, that he would slay evil and bring good into the world.

            Zadkiel thought that Abraham had taught Isaac well, and, to his horror, began to wonder why God, the father he loved and esteemed, would order the death of this bright and potential-filled young man.

            Observing Abraham only made Zadkiel’s thoughts darker, more blasphemous. Though Abraham did not break down in front of his men or his son, Zadkiel could see his eyes following Isaac’s every move, as though trying to commit everything about him to memory.

            The nights were the worst part. After Isaac and the two men slept, after even Abraham’s ass had succumbed to sleep, Zadkiel would hear Abraham’s muffled sobs, so deep and sorrowful that they sounded like he was choking on them. Though he said nothing aloud, because he was a pious man, afraid to contradict God, Zadkiel could read between the lines. Abraham was begging with his entire body, his mind and soul, not to have to complete the task set for him.

            The first night of this, Zadkiel was stalwart, did not allow himself to think deeply about the situation, but after the second night, when the third day was dawning still and gray, he could not hold it in anymore.

            How could this be just? What point could this possibly prove? How was this, the same God who had struck down Lucifer for speaking against the humans, who had demoted Uriel for the senseless slaughter of two entire towns, now ordering the death of an innocent in the cruelest way possible?

            About halfway through the third day, the little band came to the base of Moriah, where Abraham, eyes impossibly old for such a young man, ordered the two men to stay behind with the ass. He unloaded the wood that he had brought from the ass’s back and, giving a small bundle to a still animated Isaac, shouldered the majority of the load himself, then began to climb the mountain.

            Zadkiel could tell that Abraham’s unusually slow, plodding pace wasn’t due to his heavy load or the fatigue of the road, but there was only so slowly that he could go, and they inched their way up the mountain.

            It wasn’t until they were nearing the top of the mountain that Isaac noticed the obvious problem with his father’s story.

            “Father,” he called over his shoulder, bent over comically underneath his small load and about ten feet in front of Abraham. “We’re brought the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”

            Zadkiel watched Abraham come to a full stop and close his eyes for a moment. “The Lord will provide the lamb,” he said, his voice carefully controlled, and Isaac seemed to take his answer at face value.

            They reached the top of the mountain and used their wood to build up the pyre. Just as Isaac began to look around in confusion, Abraham grasped onto his arm, his grip still achingly gentle, and pulled a rope from his tunic.

            It couldn’t be said that Isaac was a stupid lad, and so he said “Father?” his voice quavering, and when Abraham didn’t answer and instead began to bind Isaac’s hands behind his back, Isaac burst into tears, struggling uselessly against his father’s grip.

            “No, Father, please,” Isaac begged, each word piercing deeply into Zadkiel’s soul. From the look on Abraham’s face, he felt it as well.

            Abraham went to his knees to bind Isaac’s feet. “I am sorry, my son,” he choked out, no longer bothering to hide his grief. “The Lord commanded it. I have no choice.”

            Isaac continued to scream and beg, but it seemed that Abraham’s mind was made up. He placed Isaac onto the pyre, still handling him gently despite what he was about to do, cradling the back of Isaac’s head to prevent it knocking against the wood. Isaac was so small that his head fit easily into the palm of one of Abraham’s hands, and that was the thing that made Zadkiel think, _I cannot allow him to do this_.

            Abraham raised the small, silver knife he’d brought along, his hand shaking so badly that Zadkiel thought he may not even be able to complete the task.

            Acting entirely on instinct, Zadkiel darted forward and grabbed onto Abraham’s wrist, just as Abraham started to bring his arm down.

            Abraham raised tear-filled eyes to where Zadkiel had made himself visible in front of him. If Zadkiel had any doubts about what he was about to do, the pure hope he saw warring with grief on Isaac’s face would have blown them right away.

            “Do not kill the boy,” Zadkiel said. “Now I know that you fear God because you have not withheld from him your son, your only son.”

            Abraham gasped out a breath like a drowning man coming up for air. The tears, which he had not let fall up until this moment, spilled over and began to flow freely down his face. Isaac had stopped screaming and struggling and was blinking up at Zadkiel as well, eyes wide with surprise and awe.

            “Thank you,” Abraham said, his voice completely broken with relief.

            Zadkiel nodded in acknowledgement, then disappeared, watching as Abraham used his knife to slash the ropes around Isaac’s wrists and ankles, drawing the boy up into his arms in a fierce hug. Isaac clung to his father’s neck, still silent but shaking with emotion.

            Zadkiel left them there in that moment of profound relief and joy. He was ready to take any punishment that God and Heaven could give to him, and he thought that he’d never felt happier or more alive.


	9. The Flowering of the Rod

“What if we win? I’m serious. I mean, screw the angels and the demons and their crap Apocalypse. They want to fight a war, they can find their own planet. This one’s ours, and I say they get the Hell off of it. We take ‘em all on. We kill the Devil. Hell, we even kill Michael if we have to, but we do it our own damn selves.”

***

            After it all, after the fight and Van Nuys and Gabriel’s death and all the horsemen, there is a small pocket of time where it is just the four of them, just Sam, Dean, Bobby, and Castiel against the world, against Heaven and Hell and God and the Devil and all of the angels and demons.

            They’re back in Bobby’s living room, and though the situation is quite different from the last time Castiel found himself here, the mood is much the same.

            Adam is gone, of course, sacrificed to Michael and likely screaming in pain at this very moment. Dean is not in the panic room anymore, couldn’t say yes to Michael even if he wanted to, and so he is the one drinking, taking large gulps of whiskey every few minutes.

            Castiel cannot look at him for too long without shuddering; the memory of the bender he’d gone on after Joshua’s assurances that God was no longer in control too fresh in his mind. He’d liked the oblivion of drink, at the time, but was less enthusiastic about both the physical pain that came the morning after and the vague memories he had of muttering impolite things at Sam in his state of intoxication.

            None of them are doing any research, tonight. They have their plan, terrible as it is, and they’re aware that none of Bobby’s books can possibly help them now.

            The tension in the room is so thick that even Castiel, ignorant as he is of human social cues, can feel it. Dean and Sam are barely speaking to each other, and Bobby, though still occasionally overcome with joy at the fact that he has his legs back, does not seem to be faring much better.

            As for Castiel, he has reached a level of peace that he had not thought possible a week ago. He knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he is approaching the end of his existence. One way or another, whether they win (unlikely) or lose (almost certain), this will lead to Castiel’s death. He will not be lucky enough to be resurrected twice, should not even have been resurrected once.

            It might not be so bad, being dead. At the very least, he can rest, stop the bone-deep exhaustion he’s been feeling ever since he began his slow fall from Grace.

            The only worry he has left is that he’ll be forced to see Dean die. He doesn’t think he could handle that.

            He wonders if that’s what love is, the determination to allow yourself to die before another does. If he uses Sam and Dean as an example, it certainly is.

            He knows, vaguely, that Sam and Dean are not typical examples of humanity. He even knows that they are not happy, and that using them as a model is neither healthy nor advisable.

            Still, Castiel has chosen them, or they have chosen him, and he wouldn’t sacrifice a second of the time he’s spent with them over the past two years for anything, not for all the happiness in the world or the stabilization of Heaven.

            The ice in Dean’s glass clinks, and the floor creaks beneath Bobby’s feet, and Sam clears his throat and shifts position in his chair.

            Castiel smiles to himself, and, for what he suspects will be the last time, sleeps.


End file.
